5 N preload, until failure using an Instron 8841 DynaMight™ Axial Testing System (Instron Corp.; Canton, MA) with a 50 N load cell. The compressive load data were plotted against displacement data, which were normalized by the height of each vertebral body (apparent strain), to determine the yield and maximum strength, compressive stiffness, and energy to maximum loading. The yield point was determined by a 0.2% strain offset. Apparent stresses were estimated by normalizing the loads by the total cross-sectional bone area of each vertebral body. To determine whether the HFD affects immature versus mature mice differently, a two-way Selleck LBH589 analysis

of variance (ANOVA) was used to elucidate the effects of diet, age group and their interaction (diet × age group). The D’Agostino–Pearson normality test was performed on each metric, which supported that the data were consistent with a Gaussian distribution. A two-way ANOVA approach was used because the interactive effect describes whether the age groups were indeed affected differently

by the HFD. Next, the persistence of any HFD-induced deficits in bone structure or strength after diet correction was assessed by comparing HFD and HFD:LFD mice across the two age groups by two-way ANOVA. Considering that there is an effect of intra-group aging between the 12 and 24 week time points, the LGK-974 mouse HFD-fed groups were normalized to their age-matched lean controls for this analysis (HFD/LFD vs. HFD:LFD/LFD:LFD). Therefore, in this normalized analysis, a significant diet effect indicates that there is a difference in the relationship of HFD-fed mice to lean controls from before and after diet correction. When interactions in the two-way ANOVAs were statistically significant, Bonferroni’s post-hoc test was used to determine whether the differences due to diet were significant within each age group. Differences were deemed statistically significant when p < 0.05. As expected, 12 weeks on the HFD induced significant weight

gain (Fig. 1A) along with elevated fasting blood glucose Smoothened (Fig. 1B) and serum leptin levels (Fig. 1C) in both immature and mature age groups of male C57BL/6J mice. The mature mice gained significantly more weight than the immature mice and had significantly greater increases in fasting blood glucose levels, as evidenced by the significant interactive effects and post-hoc comparisons. The insignificantly different leptin concentrations in the HFD-fed mice across the two age groups suggest that similar levels of obesity were reached while on this diet. Micro-CT scans of the distal femur demonstrated a lower cancellous bone volume in the HFD mice than LFD controls (Figs. 2A,B), with significantly reduced trabecular BVF in HFD compared to LFD mice. A significantly greater reduction in BVF was observed in immature than mature mice (Fig.