Setting Ambient Temperature Conditions to Optimize Translation of Molecular Work from the Mouse to Human: The "Goldilocks Solution"

Temperature has a profound effect on many aspects of murine physiology. This raises the question of the best temperature at which mice should be housed to maximize the translational potential to humans. The temperatures at which mice have been routinely kept for studies of molecular physiology (20-21 °C) maximize the comfort of animal handling staff. There is a widespread movement suggesting we should perform experiments instead on mice housed at 30 °C. This often produces very different outcomes. Here we analyze the basis of this suggestion and show that while 20-21 °C is too cold, 30 °C is probably too hot. Rather we suggest an intermediate temperature "the Goldilocks solution" of 25-26 °C is probably optimal. This should be combined with providing animals with nesting material so that they can construct nests to generate microclimates that are within their own control. Providing copious nesting material has additional spin-off advantages in terms of increasing environmental enrichment. Ultimately, however, advocating a single temperature to mimic human physiology is plagued by the problem that humans vary widely in the temperature environments they experience, with consequences for human disease. Hence studying responses at a range of temperatures may provide the greatest insights and translational potential.

Optimal housing temperatures for mice to mimic the thermal environment of humans: An experimental study

Objectives

The laboratory mouse is presently the most common model for examining mechanisms of human physiology and disease. Housing temperatures can have a large impact on the outcome of such experiments and on their translatability to the human situation. Humans usually create for themselves a thermoneutral environment without cold stress, while laboratory mice under standard conditions (≈20° C) are under constant cold stress. In a well-cited, theoretical paper by Speakman and Keijer in Molecular Metabolism, it was argued that housing mice under close to standard conditions is the optimal way of modeling the human metabolic situation. This tenet was mainly based on the observation that humans usually display average metabolic rates of about 1.6 times basal metabolic rate. The extra heat thereby produced would also be expected to lead to a shift in the ‘lower critical temperature’ towards lower temperatures.

Methods

To examine these tenets experimentally, we performed high time-resolution indirect calorimetry at different environmental temperatures on mice acclimated to different housing temperatures.

Results

Based on the high time-resolution calorimetry analysis, we found that mice already under thermoneutral conditions display mean diurnal energy expenditure rates 1.8 times higher than basal metabolism, remarkably closely resembling the human situation. At any temperature below thermoneutrality, mice metabolism therefore exceeds the human equivalent: Mice under standard conditions display energy expenditure 3.1 times basal metabolism. The discrepancy to previous conclusions is probably attributable to earlier limitations in establishing true mouse basal metabolic rate, due to low time resolution. We also found that the fact that mean energy expenditure exceeds resting metabolic rate does not move the apparent thermoneutral zone (the lower critical temperature) downwards.

Conclusions

We show that housing mice at thermoneutrality is an advantageous step towards aligning mouse energy metabolism to human energy metabolism.

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High time-resolution indirect calorimetry reveals true resting metabolic rate in mice.

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Mice at thermoneutrality display average energy expenditure 1.8 times their RMR (BMR).

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This relationship very closely resembles the human situation.

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Lower critical temperature is not influenced by enhanced energy expenditure.

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To model human metabolism, 30 °C remains the optimal housing temperature for mice.

Not so hot: Optimal housing temperatures for mice to mimic the thermal environment of humans

It has been argued that mice should be housed at 30 °C to best mimic the thermal conditions experienced by humans, and that the current practice of housing mice at 20-22 °C impairs the suitability of mice as a model for human physiology and disease. In the current paper we challenge this notion. First, we show that humans routinely occupy environments about 3 °C below their lower critical temperature (T lc), which when lightly clothed is about 23 °C. Second, we review the data for the T lc of mice. Mouse T lc is dependent on body weight and about 26-28 °C for adult mice weighing >25 g. The equivalent temperature to that normally experienced by humans for most single housed adult mice is therefore 23-25 °C. Group housing or providing the mice with bedding and nesting material might lower this to about 20-22 °C, close to current standard practice.