An Overview of Murine High Fat Diet as a Model for Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus

Abstract

Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) is a worldwide epidemic, which by all predictions will only increase. To help in combating the devastating array of phenotypes associated with T2DM a highly reproducible and human disease-similar mouse model is required for researchers. The current options are genetic manipulations to cause T2DM symptoms or diet induced obesity and T2DM symptoms. These methods to model human T2DM have their benefits and their detractions. As far as modeling the majority of T2DM cases, HFD establishes the proper etiological, pathological, and treatment options. A limitation of HFD is that it requires months of feeding to achieve the full spectrum of T2DM symptoms and no standard protocol has been established. This paper will attempt to rectify the last limitation and argue for a standard group of HFD protocols and standard analysis procedures.

Figure 1

An illustration of the positive feedback nature of type 2 diabetes mellitus and murine high fat diet. Both humans and mice continue around this circle at an increasing level of pathology until they acquire one or more of the irreversible disease outcomes at the bottom of the illustration.