Obese fruit flies increase chances for their offspring to have heart attacks.
Just like humans, fruit flies that eat diets high in either fat or sugar can become obese. Studies have demonstrated that obese fruit flies can develop many of the same symptoms and health problems associated with obesity in humans. They have blood sugar imbalances, accumulate high level of cholesterol, and are consequently more prone to heart attacks. Understanding how diabetes affects fruit flies can help us understand how it impacts humans and ease its impact on life.
A new study published earlier this year (Guida et al., 2019) from Rolf Bodmer’s laboratory at the Sanford-Burnham-Prebys Medical Discovery Institute in La Jolla, CA, found that obesity is harmful not only to the parent flies themselves, but also affects their offspring, and even the next generation after that!
Guida and colleagues dug into the regulation of this process and found that two crucial metabolic regulators, an adipose triglyceride lipase (ATGL/bmm) and its cofactor peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor-γ coactivator 1α are expressed less by the progeny of obese flies. This change in gene expression led to an increased amount of heart disease in the progeny of the obese flies.
This change in genetic expression was found to have a direct effect on DNA. Progeny of obese flies have elevated amounts of H3K27 trimethylation, which is used to regulate the shape, structure and activity of DNA.
Luckily for the progeny of the obese flies, drugs that lower the amount of H3K27 trimethylation decreased the risk of heart disease!
Overall, this is the first demonstrative study that there is generational inheritance of obesity and delineating the mechanisms of such an inheritance. Thus, research done in fruit flies fosters an improved understanding of nutrition and its relationship with human health.
Citation: Guida, M. C. et al. (2019) ‘Intergenerational inheritance of high fat diet-induced cardiac lipotoxicity in Drosophila’, Nature Communications. Springer US, 10(1), p. 193. doi: 10.1038/s41467-018-08128-3.
A new study published earlier this year (Guida et al., 2019) from Rolf Bodmer’s laboratory at the Sanford-Burnham-Prebys Medical Discovery Institute in La Jolla, CA, found that obesity is harmful not only to the parent flies themselves, but also affects their offspring, and even the next generation after that!
Guida and colleagues dug into the regulation of this process and found that two crucial metabolic regulators, an adipose triglyceride lipase (ATGL/bmm) and its cofactor peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor-γ coactivator 1α are expressed less by the progeny of obese flies. This change in gene expression led to an increased amount of heart disease in the progeny of the obese flies.
This change in genetic expression was found to have a direct effect on DNA. Progeny of obese flies have elevated amounts of H3K27 trimethylation, which is used to regulate the shape, structure and activity of DNA.
Luckily for the progeny of the obese flies, drugs that lower the amount of H3K27 trimethylation decreased the risk of heart disease!
Overall, this is the first demonstrative study that there is generational inheritance of obesity and delineating the mechanisms of such an inheritance. Thus, research done in fruit flies fosters an improved understanding of nutrition and its relationship with human health.
Citation: Guida, M. C. et al. (2019) ‘Intergenerational inheritance of high fat diet-induced cardiac lipotoxicity in Drosophila’, Nature Communications. Springer US, 10(1), p. 193. doi: 10.1038/s41467-018-08128-3.