Abstract

To determine the effects of maternal exercise training during pregnancy on skeletal muscle metabolism of the progeny, eleven female Sprague-Dawley rats were divided into an exercise and a control group. The maternal training group (6) ran on a rodent treadmill for 4 weeks prior to pregnancy and daily throughout gestation (21 days) at 26.8 m/min, 1 hour/day, 5 days per week. The measurements were taken 28 days postpartum. No differences were noted between the sedentary and trained maternal animals for succinic dehydrogenase (SDH), phosphofructokinase (PFK), and myosin ATPase activities of the soleus, plantaris and gastrocnemius muscles. Maternal gastrocnemius SDH and soleus PFK levels were significantly lower than levels found in the offspring. The liver glycogen of trained maternal animals was significantly higher than that found in all other groups. As well it was shown that maternal exercise had no effect on any of the aforementioned physiological parameters measured in the pups. The results indicate that exercise training during pregnancy does not modify the skeletal muscle metabolism of the offspring as observed 28 days after birth. Verf.-Referat