C57bl 6j

Male C57BL/6 mice were purchased from the Jackson Laboratory (Bar Harbor, ME) at 6 wks of age. The mice were maintained in the animal facility of the Pennington Biomedical Research Center with a 12:12-h light-dark cycle, constant room temperature (22–24°C), free access to water and diet. Mice were fed a high fat diet (HFD, D12331, 36% w/w or 58% calories in fat, Research Diets, New Brunswick, NJ) at 8 wks (C57BL/6J) to generate a diet-induced obese (DIO) model as described elsewhere [22 (link)]. The control mice were fed a Chow diet (5001, containing 5% w/w or 11% calories in fat, Labdiet, St. Louis, MO). All procedures were performed in accordance with the National Institutes of Health guidelines for the care and use of animals and were approved by the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC) at the Pennington Biomedical Research Center. The mouse livers were collected at 12 wks on HFD for analysis of mitochondrial proteins.

Male C57BL/6J, db/bks and db/db mice were purchased from the Charles River Laboratory Animal Technology Co., Ltd. (Beijing, China) and maintained on a regular chow diet. Two diabetic mice models were established: STZ-induced diabetic mice (n = 10) and control mice (n = 10); db/bks mice (n = 10) and db/db diabetic mice (n = 10). STZ-induced diabetes in C57BL/6J mice was performed by high-fat diet feeding (D12492, Research Diets, USA) for eight weeks and then an intraperitoneal injection of STZ (50 mg/kg body weight per day, S0130, Sigma-Aldrich Technology, Germany) in acetate phosphate buffer (C1013, pH 4.5, Solarbio, Beijing, China) for five consecutive days. Animals were considered diabetic when their blood glucose levels exceeded a pre-established value of 15 mmol/L (350 mg/dL). The db/db mice would show spontaneous elevated blood glucose and were considered diabetic when their blood glucose levels exceeded a pre-established value of 15 mmol/L (350 mg/dL) after 8 weeks. After 20 weeks of feeding, the mice were sacrificed. All animal experiments were supported by the institutional review board of Tongji Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology.

7-week-old male Apoe^−/− mice and wild-type C57BL/6J mice were obtained from Vital River Laboratory Animal Technology Co., Ltd (Beijing, China) and housed in specific pathogen-free animal rooms in climate-controlled conditions (22 ± 1°C, 40%–70% humidity) as well as diurnal conditions (12 hour light/dark cycle) with access to food and water ad libitum. After acclimatization for 1 week, 25 ApoE^−/− mice were fed high fat diet (40 kcal% fat, 1.25% cholesterol, Research Diets D12108C, USA) and, respectively, sacrificed at 0, 4, 8, 12, and 16 weeks (n = 5 for each group). The wild-type C57BL/6J were fed with low-fat diet (10 kcal% fat, 0% cholesterol, Research Diets D12102C, USA) for 16 weeks (control group, n = 6). Another 36 ApoE^−/− mice were fed high fat diet for 16 weeks. In the 8th week, the ApoE^−/− mice were injected with the vector (atherosclerosis + vector group, n = 6), the chemerin gene overexpression adenovirus (Atherosclerosis + Overexpression group, n = 6), or chemerin gene knockdown adenovirus (Atherosclerosis + Knockdown group, n = 6), respectively, from caudal vein every 2 weeks until the 16th weeks. The mice of the control group were injected with same volume of PBS in the same manner.

C57BL/6J mice were purchased from Charles River Japan. PWK mice were purchased from RIKEN BioResource Center, Tsukuba, Japan. Mice were housed in box cages, maintained on a 12-h light/12-h dark cycle. C57BL/6J and PWK male mice and F1 male progeny obtained by reciprocal crosses between them were placed into single cages and fed for 15 weeks either a normal diet (Research Diets, New Brunswick, NJ, D06072701) or a HFD (Research Diets, New Brunswick, NJ, D07012601) from 6-weeks-old.