Application of infrared thermography to the detection of changes in interscapular brown adipose tissue temperature and analysis of some blood biochemical and behavioural parameters in BALB/c and C57BL/6 mouse strains

Brown adipose tissue (BAT) has received renewed interest as a potential treatment target for obesity and comorbidities due to its thermogenic activity capacity and contribution to energy expenditure. Murine models are among the commonest preclinical models for studying human disease, including BAT studies. C57BL/6 and BALB/c are the two most commonly used mouse strains, however, different strains manifest significant behavioural differences, levels of sociability, emotionality, exercise response, respond differently to severe spinal cord injury, show differences in susceptibility to diet-induced obesity and insulin resistance, etc. To gain a broader understanding of the peculiarities, this study aimed to investigate the effect of age, strain and gender on interscapular BAT temperature changes and to analyse some blood biochemical and behavioural parameters in the aforementioned strains. The age of the mice (5–8 weeks) did not influence the interscapular BAT area temperature. The mean temperatures of the maximum (Tmax) and the average temperatures (Tisoth) in the BALB/c mice were by 0.46 °C (P