Contrasting Effects of Western vs. Mediterranean Diets on Monocyte Inflammatory Gene Expression and Social Behavior in a Primate Model

Dietary changes associated with industrialization substantially increase the prevalence of chronic diseases, such as obesity, type II diabetes, and cardiovascular disease, which are major contributors to the public health burden. The high prevalence of these chronic diseases is often attributed to an “evolutionary mismatch,” between human physiology and modern nutritional environments. In support of this idea, Western diets enriched with foods that were scarce throughout human evolutionary history (e.g., simple sugars and saturated fats) promote inflammation and disease relative to diets more akin to hunter-gatherer diets, such as a Mediterranean diet; however, the mechanisms linking dietary mismatch to inflammation and chronic disease are poorly understood. We used a macaque model and whole diet manipulations to evaluate one possible mechanism – inflammatory polarization of monocytes – that potentially leads to this evolutionary mismatch. After consuming a Western- or Mediterranean-like diet for 15 months, monocytes from Western diet consumers exhibited a more proinflammatory phenotype, with 40% of their genes differentially expressed (FDR<0.05). Compared to the Mediterranean diet, the Western diet shifted the co-expression of 445 gene pairs, including small RNAs and transcription factors associated with metabolism and adiposity in humans, and dramatically altered animal behavior. For example, Western-fed individuals were more anxious and less socially integrated compared to the Mediterranean-fed subjects. These behavioral changes were also associated with some of the effects of diet on gene expression, suggesting an interaction between diet, central nervous system activity, and monocyte gene expression. The results of this study provide new insights into evolutionary mismatch at the molecular level and uncover new pathways through which Western diets generate inflammation and disease.