B6 cg m leprdb j db db mice

Adult male C57BL/6J mice were purchased from Slack Laboratory Animal, Shanghai, China. Institute of Cancer Research(ICR)mice were purchased from Jiesijie Laboratory Animal Co., Ltd. (Shanghai, China). B6.Cg-m+/+Leprdb/J (db/db) mice and its lean littermates^+/+ (from Jackson Laboratory, Bar Harbor, ME, United States) were bred in Shanghai Institute of Materia Medica (SIMM), Chinese Academy of Sciences. The animals were housed under the conditions of constant temperature (22–24°C) and a light/dark cycle of 12 h with free access to food and water. The db/db mice were fed with high fat diet (SLAC Laboratory Animal Co., Ltd., Shanghai, China), the lean mice and ICR mice were provided with standard chow. Animal care procedures followed the National Institute of Health Guidelines on the Care and Use of Animals and were approved by the Institutional Animal Care and Utilization Committee (IACUC), Shanghai Institute of Materia Medica, Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Male Wistar-R Amsterdam rats (225–250g; bred in the Animal Facility of the Department of Anatomy, Pécs, Hungary) were used for the leptin and stress experiment, and five male C57BL/6J (WT) and five B6.Cg-m+/+Lepr^db/J (db/db) mice (10–12 wk old; obtained from The Jackson Laboratory, Bar Harbor, ME, USA), housed in the Unit for Laboratory Animal Medicine at the University of Michigan, were used for studying the effect of LepRb deficiency. All animals were housed in standard plastic cages, in a temperature- and humidity-controlled environment, on a 12 h light/dark cycle (lights on at 6:00 a.m.) with free access to food and water ad libitum. They were allowed 1 week of acclimatization before the start of the experiment. All animal procedures had the approval of the respective University care and use committees.