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Abstract
Cardiovascular autonomic neuropathy (CAN) is a common complication of diabetes mellitus. CAN is characterized by impaired cardiovascular autonomic control and is associated with increased mortality, especially among women with type 2 diabetes. Identifying environmental factors that exacerbate the CAN-associated phenotype may reveal modifiable strategies to reduce cardiovascular risk.
Nighttime light exposure is a novel cardiovascular risk factor. Among ∼90,000 individuals, greater nighttime light exposure correlated with increased atrial fibrillation and heart failure risk. Light at night disrupts sympathovagal balance and elevates nocturnal heart rate in humans. Dim light at night similarly disrupts autonomic regulation of heart rate in mice. We hypothesized that dim light at night would exacerbate CAN-associated phenotypes in female diabetic mice. We found that (1) thermoneutral housing unmasked diabetic cardiac phenotypes, (2) dim light at night worsened CAN-associated tachycardia and abolished circadian variation in heart rate, and (3) an abnormally prolonged temporal lag between correlated heart rate and core body temperature fluctuations was a consistent feature of the CAN-associated phenotype.
Female db/db mice ( Lepr −/−; JAX stock no. 000642), a type 2 diabetes model exhibiting obesity, hyperglycemia, and hypoactivity, and control mice ( Lepr +/+), aged 2–3 months, were implanted with PhysioTel ETA-F10 telemetry transmitters (Data Sciences International). After a 2-week recovery under 12-hour light/12-hour dark cycles, heart rate (RR interval) and core body temperature were continuously recorded using Ponemah (version 6.42; Data Sciences International) and analyzed with Prism (version 10.6.1; GraphPad). Procedures followed the Association for Assessment and Accreditation of Laboratory Animal Care guidelines with University of Kentucky Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee approval.
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
2026
Digital Object Identifier (DOI)
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.hrthm.2026.01.010
Funding Information
This study was supported by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (grant no. R01HL172813, to Drs Delisle and Schroder); by the National Center for Research Resources and the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences, National Institutes of Health (grant no. UL1TR001998, to Drs Delisle and Schroder); and by the Pathway to Independence Grant, the Diabetes and Obesity Research Priority Area, and the Barnstable Brown Diabetes and Obesity Center, University of Kentucky (to Dr Prabhat). The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health.
Repository Citation
Prabhat, Abhilash; Naidu, Shrishti; Stumpf, Isabel G.; Seward, Tanya S.; Schroder, Elizabeth A.; and Delisle, Brian P., "Dim light at night worsens cardiac autonomic dysregulation in female diabetic mice" (2026). Physiology Faculty Publications. 198.
https://uknowledge.uky.edu/physiology_facpub/198
Notes/Citation Information
1547-5271/© 2026 Heart Rhythm Society. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).