Undergraduate Research Journal

Effects of Dietary Phytoestrogens on Paternal Responsiveness and Maturation in the Biparental California Mouse
Aaron T. Stamp, Trey Amador
Table 1: Behavioral scores,
in 15-min paternalbehavior
tests, of male
California mice fed highsoy,
medium-soy, or lowsoy
diets (N=16 per group).
P-values are from Kruskal-
Wallis tests comparing the
three treatment groups.
Description Median (range) P
High Soy Medium Soy Low Soy
In contact with pup a 1.5 (0, 30) 0.5 (0, 30) 2 (0, 31) 0.281
>1 Body length from pup a 0 (0, 9) 1 (0, 23) 0.5 (0, 9) 0.493
Jump b 0 (0, 70) 31 (0, 548) 22.5 (0, 462) 0.074
Attack pup b 0 (0, 1) 0 (0, 1) 0 (0, 1) 0.526
Eat c 0 (0, 0.019) 0 (0, 0.107) 0 (0 , 0.078) 0.203
Approach pup c 0.398 (0, 0.933) 0.298 (0, 0.982) 0.244 (0, 0.989) 0.922
Carry pup c 0 (0, 0) 0 (0, 0.005) 0 (0, 0) 0.368
Huddle pup c 0 (0, 0.783) 0 (0, 0.958) 0 (0, 0.924) 0.400
Lick pup c 0 (0, 0.811) 0 (0, 0.814) 0 (0, 0.967) 0.388
Sniff pup c 0.119 (0, 0.801) 0 (0, 0.505) 0.0924 (0, 0.985) 0.959
Latency to approach pup d 84.120 (0, 330.62) 74.840 (2.48, 503.81) 22.460 (0, 71.92) 0.456
a
Number of 30-sec instantaneous scans
b
Total number of occurrences
c
Duration as proportion of total time
d
Seconds
although the LS group had a higher average sperm count
than the HS and MS groups.
Body Mass
A 2-way (diet x week) repeated-measures ANOVA,
using mass at weaning, weekly mean masses for weeks
1-10 after weaning, and final body mass (day before
euthanasia), revealed a significant main effect of week
Table 2: Wet and dry weights
of testes and adipose tissue
from California mice fed
high-soy, medium-soy, or
low-soy diets (N=8 per
group), as well as sperm
counts per mouse (N=8 for
LS and MS groups, N=7 for
HS group).
Organ Wet/Dry Mean ± SEM (g) P
High Soy Medium Soy Low Soy
Left testis
Wet
Dry
0.162 ± 0.025
0.024 ± 0.003
0.173 ± 0.027
0.026 ± 0.003
0.170 ± 0.013
0.028 ± 0.001
0.532 a
0.888 a
Right testis
Wet
Dry
0.151 ± 0.023
0.024 ± 0.003
0.167 ± 0.023
0.027 ± 0.003
0.165 ± 0.014
0.028 ± 0.002
0.648 a
0.898 a
Left gonadal fat pad Wet
Dry
0.173 ± 0.021
0.126 ± 0.020
0.199 ± 0.232
0.109 ± 0.171
0.217 ± 0.035
0.141 ± 0.030
0.501 a
0.544 a
Right gonadal fat pad Wet
Dry
0.166 ± 0.023
0.116 ± 0.017
0.217 ± 0.027
0.116 ± 0.019
0.216 ± 0.036
0.160 ± 0.031
0.234 a
0.171 a
Left longitudinal fat pad Wet
Dry
0.784 ± 0.117
0.448 ± 0.089
0.805 ± 0.118
0.508 ± 0.102
0.853 ± 0.139
0.519 ± 0.105
0.758 a
0.590 a
Right longitudinal fat pad Wet
Dry
0.813 ± 0.126
0.442 ± 0.071
0.861 ± 0.117
0.536 ± 0.090
0.861 ± 0.143
0.524 ± 0.101
0.791 a
0.435 a
Back fat pad
Wet
Dry
0.328 ± 0.188
0.051 ± 0.039
0.402 ± 0.084
0.159 ± 0.035
0.481 ± 0.117
0.267 ± 0.063
0.259 a
0.168 a
Sperm Count (X 106) 12.89 ± 1.04 12.97 ± 3.07 13.72 ± 2.63 0.967 b
a
Main effect of diet from ANCOVA using body mass as a covariate.
b
Main effect of diet from one-way ANOVA.
4 6 U C R U n d e r g r a d u a t e R e s e a r c h J o u r n a l