Moderate aerobic exercise training ameliorates impairment of mitochondrial function and dynamics in skeletal muscle of high-fat diet-induced obese mice

The purpose of this study is to determine whether moderate aerobic exercise training improves high-fat diet-induced alterations in mitochondrial function and structure in the skeletal muscle. Male 4-week-old C57BL/6 mice were randomly divided into four groups: control (CON), control plus exercise (CON + EX), high-fat diet (HFD), and high-fat diet plus exercise (HFD + EX). After obesity was induced by 20 weeks of 60% HFD, treadmill exercise training was performed at 13-16 m/min, 40-50 min/day, and 6 days/week for 12 weeks. Mitochondrial structure, function, and dynamics, and mitophagy were analyzed in the skeletal muscle fibers from the red gastrocnemius. Exercise training increased mitochondrial number and area and reduced high-fat diet-induced obesity and hyperglycemia. In addition, exercise training attenuated mitochondrial dysfunction in the permeabilized myofibers, indicating that HFD-induced decrease of mitochondrial O₂ respiration and Ca²⁺ retention capacity and increase of mitochondrial H₂ O₂ emission were attenuated in the HFD + EX group compared to the HFD group. Exercise also ameliorated HFD-induced imbalance of mitochondrial fusion and fission, demonstrating that HFD-induced decrease in fusion protein levels was elevated, and increase in fission protein levels was reduced in the HFD + EX groups compared with the HFD group. Moreover, dysregulation of mitophagy induced by HFD was mitigated in the HFD + EX group, indicating a decrease in PINK1 protein level. Our findings demonstrated that moderate aerobic exercise training mitigated obesity-induced insulin resistance by improving mitochondrial function, and reversed obesity-induced mitochondrial structural damage by improving mitochondrial dynamics and mitophagy, suggesting that moderate aerobic exercise training may play a therapeutic role in protecting the skeletal muscle against mitochondrial impairments and insulin resistance induced by obesity.