Transcription profiling of mouse liver from animals that vary in adiposity and insulin sensitivity

Adipose tissue gene expression was profiled from perigonadal adipose tissue of mice whose body mass and insulin sensitivity varied as a function of diet, gender, monogenic mutations and insulin sensitizing therapies. Mice were 22-24 weeks of age and sacrificed between 2-3 hours into the light portion of a 12/12 dark-light cycle. The goal was to identify transcripts whose adipose tissue expression is correlated with adiposity, insulin sensitivity and other measures of metabolic function. Experiment Overall Design: Mice on the C57BL/6J strain were housed in groups of 3-5 and fed ad libitum. 2-4 days prior to collection of adipose tissue fasting blood glucose and serum insulin concentrations were measured. Mice were sacrificed 2-3 hours into the light cycle. RNA was extracted from perigonadal adipose tissue and used to generate labeled cRNA for hybridization to Affymetrix Mu74Av2 microarrays.