Figure 1
Prevalence of exercise tolerant (T) and intolerant (inT) heart failure (HF) rats and echocardiographic parameters after 6 weeks of exercise training (EX). (A) Timeline of experiments. HF surgery was performed at week 0. After 2 weeks, echocardiography and chemoreflex test were performed and then exercise training was started. Exercise tolerance (EX-T) and intolerance (EX-inT) classification was performed 2 weeks after the initiation of the exercise program. In a separate experiment, carotid bodies were ablated (CBA) bilaterally in HF + EX-T rats. Finally, at 8 weeks post-HF induction, we performed terminal physiological cardiorespiratory measurements. (B) Total training times. During the first 2 weeks of training, daily training times are reported. After the second week of training up to the end of the experiment (8 weeks post-HF induction) data is reported on a weekly basis. Note that total training time was 70% lower in HF + EX-inT rats. (C) Prevalence of tolerant vs intolerant HF rats. (D) representative recordings of echocardiography in M-mode from one sedentary HF rat (HF + Sed), one HF + EX-T rat and one HF + EX-inT rat. (E–J) Summary data of left ventricular (LV) end diastolic diameter (LVEDD), LV end systolic diameter (LVESD), LV fractional shortening (LVFS), LV end diastolic volume (LVEDV), LV end systolic volume (LVESV) and LV ejection fraction (LVEF), respectively. Note that LVFS, LVESV and LVEF, were reduced, increased and reduced, respectively in HF + EX-T and HF + EX-inT rats compared to HF + Sed rats. *p < 0.05 vs. HF + Sed. HF + Sed, n = 6; HF + EX-T, n = 7; HF + EX-inT, n = 5 rats.
