The cellular and functional complexity of thermogenic fat.
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ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Cohen P
PROVIDER: S-EPMC8159882 | biostudies-literature |
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
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Project description:BACKGROUND:Recent studies suggest human neck brown adipose tissue (BAT) to consist of 'brown adipocyte (BA)-like' or beige adipocytes. However, little is known about their thermogenic function. Within the beige adipocyte transcriptome, fibroblast growth factor-21 (FGF21) is a gene whose protein product acts as an adipokine, regulating cold-induced thermogenesis in animals. Here, we explored (i) the adipogenic potential, thermogenic function and FGF21 secretory capacity of beige adipocytes derived from human neck fat and (ii) the role of FGF21 in modulating adipose bioenergetics. METHODS:Progenitors isolated from human cervical fat were differentiated into adipocytes with either a BA-like or white adipocyte (WA) phenotype. FGF21 secretion was measured by enzyme-linked immuosorbent assay. Real-time PCR/western blotting was used to determine cellular mRNA/protein levels. Extracellular flux bioanalyzer was used to quantify adipocyte oxygen consumption and fatty acid oxidation. Adipocyte heat production was measured by infrared thermography. RESULTS:Under hormonal manipulation, primary human neck pre-adipocytes differentiated into adipocytes with either BA-like or WA phenotypes, on gene/protein and functional levels. BA-like cells expressed beige but not classic BA markers. During BA differentiation, FGF21 gene expression and secretion were increased, and were augmented following norepinephrine exposure (a cold mimic in vitro). Differentiated WA expressed ?-klotho, a critical co-factor mediating FGF21 action. Treatment of WA with FGF21-induced UCP1 expression and increased oxygen consumption, respiratory uncoupling, norepinephrine-mediated thermogenesis, fatty acid oxidation and heat production, thus recapitulating the association between cold-induced FGF21 secretion and cold-induced thermogenesis in vivo. CONCLUSION:Beige adipocytes are thermogenic in humans. FGF21 is a beige adipokine capable of promoting a brown fat-like thermogenic program in WAs. SIGNIFICANCE:This study provides first evidence of inducible functional thermogenic beige adipogenesis in human neck fat. FGF21 holds promise as a cold-induced beige adipokine with metabolic benefits of therapeutic relevance through browning of white adipose tissue.
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Project description:Brown adipose tissue (BAT) adaptively transfers energy from glucose and fat into heat by inducing a gene network that uncouples mitochondrial electron transport. However, the innate transcription factors that enable the rapid adaptive response of BAT are unclear. Here, we identify estrogen-related receptor gamma (ERR?) as a critical factor for maintaining BAT identity. ERR? is selectively expressed in BAT versus WAT, in which, in the absence of PGC1?, it drives a signature transcriptional network of thermogenic and oxidative genes in the basal (i.e., thermoneutral) state. Mice lacking ERR? in adipose tissue (ERR?KO mice) display marked downregulation of BAT-selective genes that leads to a pronounced whitening of BAT. Consistent with the transcriptional changes, the thermogenic capacity of ERR?KO mice is severely blunted, such that they fail to survive an acute cold challenge. These findings reveal a role for ERR? as a critical thermoneutral maintenance factor required to prime BAT for thermogenesis.
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Project description:Comprehensive dissection of protein functions entails more complicated manipulations than simply eliminating the protein of interest. Established knockdown technologies, such as RNA interference, antisense oligodeoxynucleotides, or ribozymes, are limited for specific applications such as modulating protein levels or specific targeting of a posttranslationally modified subpopulation. Here we show that the engineered Skp1, Cullin 1, and F-box-containing betaTrCP substrate receptor ubiquitin-proteolytic system, designated protein knockout, could achieve not only total elimination but also rapid and systematic reduction of a given cellular protein. Stable expression of a single engineered betaTrCP demonstrated simultaneous and sustained degradation of the entire retinoblastoma family proteins. Furthermore, the engineered betaTrCP was capable of selecting hypo- but not hyperphosphorylated forms of retinoblastoma for degradation. The engineered betaTrCP has been extensively modified to increase its specificity in substrate selection. This optimized protein-knockout system offers a powerful and versatile proteomic tool to dissect diverse functional properties of cellular proteins in somatic cells.
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Project description:Menopause is associated with bone loss and enhanced visceral adiposity. A polyclonal antibody that targets the ?-subunit of the pituitary hormone follicle-stimulating hormone (Fsh) increases bone mass in mice. Here, we report that this antibody sharply reduces adipose tissue in wild-type mice, phenocopying genetic haploinsufficiency for the Fsh receptor gene Fshr. The antibody also causes profound beiging, increases cellular mitochondrial density, activates brown adipose tissue and enhances thermogenesis. These actions result from the specific binding of the antibody to the ?-subunit of Fsh to block its action. Our studies uncover opportunities for simultaneously treating obesity and osteoporosis.
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Project description:Disease tolerance, the capacity of tissues to withstand damage caused by a stimulus without a decline in host fitness, varies across tissues, environmental conditions, and physiologic states. While disease tolerance is a known strategy of host defense, its role in noninfectious diseases has been understudied. Here, we provide evidence that a thermogenic fat-epithelial cell axis regulates intestinal disease tolerance during experimental colitis. We find that intestinal disease tolerance is a metabolically expensive trait, whose expression is restricted to thermoneutral mice and is not transferable by the microbiota. Instead, disease tolerance is dependent on the adrenergic state of thermogenic adipocytes, which indirectly regulate tolerogenic responses in intestinal epithelial cells. Our work has identified an unexpected mechanism that controls intestinal disease tolerance with implications for colitogenic diseases.
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Project description:BACKGROUND/OBJECTIVES:Thermogenic fat is present in humans and emerging evidence indicates that increasing the content and activity of these adipocytes may lead to weight loss and improved metabolic health. Multiple reporter systems have been developed to assay thermogenic fat activity based on the transcriptional and translational activation of Ucp1, the key molecule that mediates nonshivering thermogenesis. Our study aims to develop a much-needed tool to monitor thermogenic fat activity through a mechanism independent of Ucp1 regulation, therefore effectively assaying not only canonical ?-adrenergic activation but also various non-UCP1-mediated thermogenic pathways that have been increasingly appreciated. METHODS:We detected increased luciferase activity upon thermogenic activation in interscapular brown and inguinal subcutaneous fat in ODD-Luc mice, a hypoxia reporter mouse model. We then developed an OLTAM (ODD-Luc based Thermogenic Activity Measurement) system to assay thermogenic fat cell activity. RESULTS:In both primary murine and human adipocytes and an immortalized adipose cell line that were transduced with the OLTAM system, luciferase activity can be readily measured and visualized by bioluminescence imaging in response to a variety of stimuli, including UCP1-independent thermogenic signaling. This system can offer a convenient method to assay thermogenic activity for both basic and translational research. CONCLUSIONS:The OLTAM system offers a convenient way to measure the activation of thermogenic fat and presents opportunities to discover novel signaling pathways and unknown compounds targeting metabolically active adipocytes to counteract human obesity.
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Project description:The profound energy-expending nature of brown adipose tissue (BAT) thermogenesis makes it an attractive target tissue to combat obesity-associated metabolic disorders. While cold exposure is the strongest inducer of BAT activity, the temporal mechanisms tuning BAT adaptation during this activation process are incompletely understood. Here we show that the scaffold protein Afadin is dynamically regulated by cold in BAT, and participates in cold acclimation. Cold exposure acutely increases Afadin protein levels and its phosphorylation in BAT. Knockdown of Afadin in brown pre-adipocytes does not alter adipogenesis but restricts β3-adrenegic induction of thermogenic genes expression and HSL phosphorylation in mature brown adipocytes. Consistent with a defect in thermogenesis, an impaired cold tolerance was observed in fat-specific Afadin knockout mice. However, while Afadin depletion led to reduced Ucp1 mRNA induction by cold, stimulation of Ucp1 protein was conserved. Transcriptomic analysis revealed that fat-specific ablation of Afadin led to decreased functional enrichment of gene sets controlling essential metabolic functions at thermoneutrality in BAT, whereas it led to an altered reprogramming in response to cold, with enhanced enrichment of different pathways related to metabolism and remodeling. Collectively, we demonstrate a role for Afadin in supporting the adrenergic response in brown adipocytes and BAT function.
| S-EPMC8105362 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Sympathetic nervous system (SNS) innervation into brown adipose tissue (BAT) has been viewed as an impetus for brown fat thermogenesis. However, we surprisingly discovered that BAT SNS innervation is dispensable for mice to maintain proper body temperature during a prolonged cold exposure. Here we aimed to uncover the physiological factors compensating for maintaining brown fat thermogenesis in the absence of BAT innervation. After an initial decline of body temperature during cold exposure, mice with SNS surgical denervation in interscapular BAT gradually recovered their temperature comparable to that of sham-operated mice. The surgically denervated BAT also maintained a sizable uncoupling protein 1 (UCP1) protein along with basal norepinephrine (NE) at a similar level to that of sham controls, which were associated with increased circulating NE. Furthermore, the denervated mice exhibited increased free fatty acid levels in circulation. Indeed, surgical denervation of mice with CGI-58 deletion in adipocytes, a model lacking lipolytic capacity to release fatty acids from WAT, dramatically reduced BAT UCP1 protein and rendered the mice susceptible to cold. We conclude that circulating fatty acids and NE may serve as key factors for maintaining BAT thermogenic function and body temperature in the absence of BAT sympathetic innervation.
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Project description:Protein arginine methyltransferases (PRMTs) are enzymes that regulate the evolutionarily conserved process of arginine methylation. It has been reported that PRMTs are involved in many metabolic regulatory pathways. However, until now, their roles in adipocyte function, especially browning and thermogenesis, have not been evaluated. Even though Prmt1 adipocyte-specific-deleted mice (Prmt1fl/flAQcre) appeared normal at basal level, following cold exposure or ?-adrenergic stimulation, impaired induction of the thermogenic program was observed in both the interscapular brown adipose tissue and inguinal white adipose tissue of Prmt1fl/flAQcre mice compared with littermate controls. Different splicing variants of Prmt1 have been reported. Among them, PRMT1 variant 1 and PRMT1 variant 2 (PRMT1V2) are well conserved between humans and mice. Both variants contribute to the activation of thermogenic fat, with PRMT1V2 playing a more dominant role. Mechanistic studies using cultured murine and human adipocytes revealed that PRMT1V2 mediates thermogenic fat activation through PGC1?, a transcriptional coactivator that has been shown to play a key role in mitochondrial biogenesis. To our knowledge, our data are the first to demonstrate that PRMT1 plays a regulatory role in thermogenic fat function. These findings suggest that modulating PRMT1 activity may represent new avenues to regulate thermogenic fat and mediate energy homeostasis. This function is conserved in human primary adipocytes, suggesting that further investigation of this pathway may ultimately lead to therapeutic strategies against human obesity and associated metabolic disorders.
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Project description:Brown fat generates heat via the mitochondrial uncoupling protein UCP1, defending against hypothermia and obesity. Recent data suggest that there are two distinct types of brown fat: classical brown fat derived from a myf-5 cellular lineage and UCP1-positive cells that emerge in white fat from a non-myf-5 lineage. Here, we report the isolation of "beige" cells from murine white fat depots. Beige cells resemble white fat cells in having extremely low basal expression of UCP1, but, like classical brown fat, they respond to cyclic AMP stimulation with high UCP1 expression and respiration rates. Beige cells have a gene expression pattern distinct from either white or brown fat and are preferentially sensitive to the polypeptide hormone irisin. Finally, we provide evidence that previously identified brown fat deposits in adult humans are composed of beige adipocytes. These data provide a foundation for studying this mammalian cell type with therapeutic potential. PAPERCLIP:
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