Sex-specific differences in mediobasal hypothalamus in response to nutritional states

The arcuate nucleus of the hypothalamus plays a central role in sensing and integrating nutritional, hormonal, and neural signals that regulate feeding, energy homeostasis, growth, and reproduction, all of which show pronounced sex differences. However, the cellular mechanisms underlying these responses remain poorly understood. We performed snRNA-seq of the mediobasal hypothalamus, focusing on the arcuate nucleus, in female and male mice under different nutritional states. Analysis of 42 cell types revealed that Agrp neurons were most sensitive to nutritional changes, dopaminergic neurons showed strong sex-specific differences, and KNDy neurons were highly responsive to both sex and nutrition. Pomc neurons displayed moderate nutritional sensitivity. Most glial populations were stable, although microglia and oligodendrocytes showed moderate variation. Cell-cell communication analysis identified neurotrophic factor signaling as a key pathway regulated by sex and nutrition. This study represents a major effort to comprehensively characterize sex-specific differences in arcuate nucleus response across nutritional conditions.