Does "mouse chow" mean "mouse meal"?

chow: informal terms for a meal here?

Context:

Animals
All experimental animals were maintained on a C57BL/6J background on a 12-h light/dark cycle in a pathogen-free animal facility at Nanjing University. The Institutional Review Board of Nanjing University approved all housing and surgical procedures. At 10 weeks of age, each mouse was fed fresh rice total RNA (80 µg), synthetic MIR168a (300 pmol), or synthetic methylated MIR168a (300 pmol) by gavage after fasting overnight. After a fixed time interval (i.e., 0.5 h, 3 h, or 6 h), serum and tissues were collected and total RNA was extracted. In a separate experiment, after fasting overnight, two groups of 10-week-old male mice were placed on a diet of either mouse chow (the fundamental ingredients of the chow diet are listed in Supplementary information, Table S5) or fresh rice. Fresh food was administered every 3 days from a supply stored at -20 °C, and food consumption and body weight were measured. The mice were maintained on the diets for a fixed time interval (i.e., 0.5, 3, or 6 h, or 1, 3, or 7 days), after which serum and tissues were collected. Furthermore, the mice fed on rice received tail vein injections of ncRNA or anti-MIR168a (10 nmol each). After a fixed time interval (i.e., 0.5, 3, or 6 h, or 1, 3, or 7 days), sera and tissues were collected. Several mice were euthanized directly after overnight fasting, and their sera and tissues were collected as a control. In a separate experiment, synthetic MIR168a or ncRNA (100 pmol) were mixed evenly with 5 g of mouse chow. To avoid miRNA degradation and contamination, this food was prepared before feeding. qRT-PCR was used to

MOre:
http://www.nature.com/cr/journal/v22/n1/full/cr2011158a.html