Nutritional, Metabolic, and Toxic Disorders of Nonhuman Primates

In humans, a plethora of metabolic diseases exists, i.e. disorders that disrupt the cell’s ability to process or transport proteins, carbohydrates, or lipids. It is likely that in nonhuman primates, the same variety of diseases exists as in humans, but much less is known from those species, which are primarily housed in laboratories under controlled conditions and for a limited life span. In striking similarity to humans, the most common metabolic diseases in captive nonhuman primates are obesity and diabetes. These disorders bear striking similarity to the human counterpart and are associated with a high-caloric diet and insufficient exercise. Amyloidosis is a well-known age-related phenomenon in nonhuman primates and is only diagnosed at necropsy unless it has reached a critical stage. Fatty liver syndrome is a syndrome that occurs in overweight animals which rapidly loose body weight for any reason. It is rare today, but has been well described in the literature. Other metabolic diseases of primates, such as metabolic bone diseases, are rarely reported in modern-day humans but can be relatively common in captive nonhuman primates. Metabolic bone disease in common marmosets has proven to be a difficult disease to manage due to differing clinical and pathologic case presentations and undetermined cause, although a metabolic pathogenesis such as vitamin deficiency is suspected.