scholarly journals Defining Akt actions in muscle differentiation

2012 ◽  
Vol 303 (12) ◽  
pp. C1292-C1300 ◽  
Author(s):  
Samantha Gardner ◽  
Magdalena Anguiano ◽  
Peter Rotwein

Muscle development in childhood and muscle regeneration in adults are highly regulated processes that are necessary for reaching and maintaining optimal muscle mass and strength throughout life. Muscle repair after injury relies on stem cells, termed satellite cells, whose activity is controlled by complex signals mediated by cell-cell contact, by growth factors, and by hormones, which interact with genetic programs controlled by myogenic transcription factors. Insulin-like growth factors (IGFs) play key roles in muscle development and help coordinate muscle repair after injury, primarily by stimulating the phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase-Akt signaling pathway, and both in vitro and in vivo studies have shown that Akt kinase activity is critical for optimal muscle growth and regeneration. Here we find that of the two Akts expressed in muscle, Akt1 is essential for initiation of differentiation in culture and is required for normal myoblast motility, while Akt2 is dispensable. Although Akt2 deficiency did lead to diminished myotube maturation, as assessed by a decline in myofiber area and in fusion index, either Akt1 or Akt2 could restore these processes toward normal. Thus levels of Akt expression rather than distinct actions of individual Akt species are critical for normal myofiber development during the later stages of muscle differentiation.

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Julie Melendez ◽  
Daniel Sieiro ◽  
David Salgado ◽  
Valérie Morin ◽  
Marie-Julie Dejardin ◽  
...  

AbstractFusion of nascent myoblasts to pre-existing myofibres is critical for skeletal muscle growth and repair. The vast majority of molecules known to regulate myoblast fusion are necessary in this process. Here, we uncover, through high-throughput in vitro assays and in vivo studies in the chicken embryo, that TGFβ (SMAD2/3-dependent) signalling acts specifically and uniquely as a molecular brake on muscle fusion. While constitutive activation of the pathway arrests fusion, its inhibition leads to a striking over-fusion phenotype. This dynamic control of TGFβ signalling in the embryonic muscle relies on a receptor complementation mechanism, prompted by the merging of myoblasts with myofibres, each carrying one component of the heterodimer receptor complex. The competence of myofibres to fuse is likely restored through endocytic degradation of activated receptors. Altogether, this study shows that muscle fusion relies on TGFβ signalling to regulate its pace.


2009 ◽  
Vol 21 (03) ◽  
pp. 149-155 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hsu-Wei Fang

Cartilage injuries may be caused by trauma, biomechanical imbalance, or degenerative changes of joint. Unfortunately, cartilage has limited capability to spontaneous repair once damaged and may lead to progressive damage and degeneration. Cartilage tissue-engineering techniques have emerged as the potential clinical strategies. An ideal tissue-engineering approach to cartilage repair should offer good integration into both the host cartilage and the subchondral bone. Cells, scaffolds, and growth factors make up the tissue engineering triad. One of the major challenges for cartilage tissue engineering is cell source and cell numbers. Due to the limitations of proliferation for mature chondrocytes, current studies have alternated to use stem cells as a potential source. In the recent years, a lot of novel biomaterials has been continuously developed and investigated in various in vitro and in vivo studies for cartilage tissue engineering. Moreover, stimulatory factors such as bioactive molecules have been explored to induce or enhance cartilage formation. Growth factors and other additives could be added into culture media in vitro, transferred into cells, or incorporated into scaffolds for in vivo delivery to promote cellular differentiation and tissue regeneration.Based on the current development of cartilage tissue engineering, there exist challenges to overcome. How to manipulate the interactions between cells, scaffold, and signals to achieve the moderation of implanted composite differentiate into moderate stem cells to differentiate into hyaline cartilage to perform the optimum physiological and biomechanical functions without negative side effects remains the target to pursue.


2019 ◽  
Vol 28 (12) ◽  
pp. 1490-1506 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yu You ◽  
Di-guang Wen ◽  
Jian-ping Gong ◽  
Zuo-jin Liu

Liver transplantation has been deemed the best choice for end-stage liver disease patients but immune rejection after surgery is still a serious problem. Patients have to take immunosuppressive drugs for a long time after liver transplantation, and this often leads to many side effects. Mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) gradually became of interest to researchers because of their powerful immunomodulatory effects. In the past, a large number of in vitro and in vivo studies have demonstrated the great potential of MSCs for participation in posttransplant immunomodulation. In addition, MSCs also have properties that may potentially benefit patients undergoing liver transplantation. This article aims to provide an overview of the current understanding of the immunomodulation achieved by the application of MSCs in liver transplantation, to discuss the problems that may be encountered when using MSCs in clinical practice, and to describe some of the underlying capabilities of MSCs in liver transplantation. Cell–cell contact, soluble molecules, and exosomes have been suggested to be critical approaches to MSCs’ immunoregulation in vitro; however, the exact mechanism, especially in vivo, is still unclear. In recent years, the clinical safety of MSCs has been proven by a series of clinical trials. The obstacles to the clinical application of MSCs are decreasing, but large sample clinical trials involving MSCs are still needed to further study their clinical effects.


2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. e000172 ◽  
Author(s):  
Inês T Simões ◽  
Fernando Aranda ◽  
Sergi Casadó-Llombart ◽  
María Velasco-de Andrés ◽  
Cristina Català ◽  
...  

BackgroundCD6 is a lymphocyte surface co-receptor physically associated with the T-cell receptor (TCR)/CD3 complex at the center of the immunological synapse. There, CD6 assists in cell-to-cell contact stabilization and modulation of activation/differentiation events through interaction with CD166/ALCAM (activated leukocyte cell adhesion molecule), its main reported ligand. While accumulating evidence is attracting new interest on targeting CD6 for therapeutic purposes in autoimmune disorders, little is known on its potential in cancer. In an attempt to elucidate the in vivo relevance of blocking CD6-mediated interactions in health and disease, we explored the consequences of expressing high circulating levels of a soluble form CD6 (sCD6) as a decoy receptor.MethodsHigh sCD6 serum levels were achieved by using transgenic C57BL/6 mice expressing human sCD6 under the control of lymphoid-specific transcriptional elements (shCD6LckEμTg) or wild type either transduced with hepatotropic adeno-associated virus coding for mouse sCD6 or undergoing repeated infusions of recombinant human sCD6 protein. Characterization of sCD6-induced changes was performed by ex vivo flow cytometry and functional analyses of mouse lymphoid organ cells. The in vivo relevance of those changes was explored by challenging mice with subcutaneous or metastatic tumors induced by syngeneic cancer cells of different lineage origins.ResultsThrough a combination of in vitro and in vivo studies, we show that circulating sCD6 expression induces defective regulatory T cell (Treg) generation and function, decreased CD166/ALCAM-mediated tumor cell proliferation/migration and impaired galectin-induced T-cell apoptosis, supporting the fact that sCD6 modulates antitumor lymphocyte effector function and tumorigenesis. Accordingly, sCD6 expression in vivo resulted in delayed subcutaneous tumor growth and/or reduced metastasis on challenge of mice with syngeneic cancer cells.ConclusionsEvidence is provided for the disruption of CD6 receptor–ligand interactions as a feasible immunomodulatory approach in cancer.


2019 ◽  
Vol 20 (18) ◽  
pp. 4617 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paula Renee Chen ◽  
Yeunsu Suh ◽  
Sangsu Shin ◽  
Rachel Marie Woodfint ◽  
Seongsoo Hwang ◽  
...  

Myostatin (MSTN) negatively regulates muscle growth and development through inhibiting myoblast proliferation and differentiation. Five alternative splicing isoforms of MSTN (MSTN-A to MSTN-E) have been discovered in domestic avian species. MSTN-A has high expression in skeletal muscle and encodes the full-length peptide with anti-myogenic activity. Another isoform, MSTN-B, is also highly expressed in skeletal muscle and encodes a truncated peptide that has pro-myogenic capabilities in vitro, which include promoting the proliferation and differentiation of quail muscle precursor cells. The objective of this study was to investigate overexpression of MSTN-B in vivo by using two independent lines of transgenic Japanese quail with expression directed in the skeletal muscle. Unexpectedly, the chicken skeletal muscle alpha actin 1 (cACTA1) promoter resulted in restricted exogenous MSTN-B protein expression to certain skeletal muscles, such as the gastrocnemius and tibialis anterior, but not the pectoralis major muscle. Gastrocnemius weight as a percentage of body weight in transgenic quail was increased compared to non-transgenic quail at posthatch day 21 (D21) and posthatch D42. An increase in the size of the gastrocnemius in transgenic quail was attributed to an increase in fiber number but not fiber cross-sectional area (CSA). During embryonic development, paired box 7 (PAX7) expression was prolonged in the transgenic embryos, but other myogenic regulatory factors (MRFs) were unchanged after MSTN-B overexpression. Taken together, these data provide novel insights into the regulation of skeletal muscle development by alternative splicing mechanisms in avians.


eLife ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 9 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura L Arnold ◽  
Alessandra Cecchini ◽  
Danny A Stark ◽  
Jacqueline Ihnat ◽  
Rebecca N Craigg ◽  
...  

The conversion of proliferating skeletal muscle precursors (myoblasts) to terminally-differentiated myocytes is a critical step in skeletal muscle development and repair. We show that EphA7, a juxtacrine signaling receptor, is expressed on myocytes during embryonic and fetal myogenesis and on nascent myofibers during muscle regeneration in vivo. In EphA7-/- mice, hindlimb muscles possess fewer myofibers at birth, and those myofibers are reduced in size and have fewer myonuclei and reduced overall numbers of precursor cells throughout postnatal life. Adult EphA7-/- mice have reduced numbers of satellite cells and exhibit delayed and protracted muscle regeneration, and satellite cell-derived myogenic cells from EphA7-/- mice are delayed in their expression of differentiation markers in vitro. Exogenous EphA7 extracellular domain will rescue the null phenotype in vitro, and will also enhance commitment to differentiation in WT cells. We propose a model in which EphA7 expression on differentiated myocytes promotes commitment of adjacent myoblasts to terminal differentiation.


2006 ◽  
Vol 27 (2) ◽  
pp. 518-525 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Haberland ◽  
Michael A. Arnold ◽  
John McAnally ◽  
Dillon Phan ◽  
Yuri Kim ◽  
...  

ABSTRACT Skeletal muscle development is controlled by the myocyte enhancer factor (MEF2) and myogenic basic helix-loop-helix (bHLH) families of transcription factors, which associate and synergistically activate muscle gene expression. Muscle differentiation is further reinforced by positive-feedback loops in which myogenic bHLH proteins activate their own expression and the expression of MEF2, while MEF2 stimulates expression of myogenic bHLH genes and the Mef2c gene. Here we describe a myogenic negative-feedback loop that consists of MEF2 proteins and the transcriptional repressor histone deacetylase 9 (HDAC9). We show that the HDAC9 gene is a direct transcriptional target of MEF2 in vitro and in vivo. HDAC9 can associate with MEF2 proteins and suppress their transcriptional activity. The transcriptional repressor HDAC9 thus forms a negative-feedback loop in the transcriptional circuitry of muscle differentiation.


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