Hormonal regulation of glycogen synthase phosphorylation in perfused rat skeletal muscle

Toxic influence of organophosphate, carbamate, and organochlorine pesticides on cellular metabolism of lipids, proteins, and carbohydrates: a systematic review

Pesticides, including organophosphate (OP), organochlorine (OC), and carbamate (CB) compounds, are widely used in agricultural and indoor purposes. OP and CB act as acetyl cholinesterase (AChE) inhibitors that affect lots of organs such as peripheral and central nervous systems, muscles, liver, pancreas, and brain, whereas OC are neurotoxic involved in alteration of ion channels. There are several reports about metabolic disorders, hyperglycemia, and also oxidative stress in acute and chronic exposures to pesticides that are linked with diabetes and other metabolic disorders. In this respect, there are several in vitro and in vivo but few clinical studies about mechanism underlying these effects. Bibliographic databases were searched for the years 1963-2010 and resulted in 1652 articles. After elimination of duplicates or irrelevant papers, 204 papers were included and reviewed. Results indicated that OP and CB impair the enzymatic pathways involved in metabolism of carbohydrates, fats and protein within cytoplasm, mitochondria, and proxisomes. It is believed that OP and CB show this effect through inhibition of AChE or affecting target organs directly. OC mostly affect lipid metabolism in the adipose tissues and change glucose pathway in other cells. As a shared mechanism, all OP, CB and OC induce cellular oxidative stress via affecting mitochondrial function and therefore disrupt neuronal and hormonal status of the body. Establishing proper epidemiological studies to explore exact relationships between exposure levels to these pesticides and rate of resulted metabolic disorders in human will be helpful.

Insulin but not progesterone promotes the biosynthesis of glycogen in Xenopus laevis oocytes: implications on the control of glycogen synthase by phosphorylation, dephosphorylation

Insulin, the well-known hypoglycemic hormone, mimics progesterone in promoting the resumption of meiosis within the oocyte of Xenopus laevis. Both hormones exert their action through the inhibition of protein kinases and the activation of protein phosphatases. Because glycogen synthase is an enzyme regulated by a kinases/phosphatases cascade, we investigated the effect of insulin and progesterone on the regulation of glycogen synthesis and glycogen synthase throughout the oogenesis of Xenopus laevis oocytes. In this framework the maximal activity of synthase "a" is concomitant with the vitellogenic period characterized by a drastic increase in the amount of glycogen. Oocyte glycogen synthase is inhibited by cAMP-dependent phosphorylation and stimulated by 20 mM Mg2+. The magnesium effect is inhibited by mu molar concentrations of okadaic acid and suggests that oocyte glycogen synthase is activated by dephosphorylation achieved by protein phosphatase-1. The okadaic acid effect is itself thwarted by the specific inhibitor of protein kinase A, confirming the role of this kinase in the regulation of glycogen synthase. Finally, working on intact ripe oocytes, we showed that insulin but not progesterone increases glycogen synthesis and glycogen synthase "a" activity and lowers the rates of phosphorylation, especially in the glycogen-bound proteins.

Amino-terminal sequence analysis of rat heart and muscle glycogen synthase: homology to the rabbit enzyme and the implications for hormonal control

Glycogen synthase was purified from rat heart and muscle and electroblotted from sodium dodecyl sulfate polyacrylamide gels to polyvinylidene difluoride, and the NH2-terminal amino acid sequence was determined. The NH2-terminal amino acid sequence of the enzymes was identical. Further, phosphorylation site 2, a major cyclic AMP-dependent protein kinase recognition site in the rabbit muscle isozyme, is conserved in the rat isozymes suggesting that it serves an important function in hormonal regulation. However, two potentially important differences were observed. Threonine-5 and valine-8 of the rabbit muscle enzyme are serine and methionine residues, respectively, in the rat isozyme, the latter being critical in the analysis of phosphopeptides produced by cyanogen bromide cleavage. These variations may provide a partial explanation for previously observed differences in rat and rabbit phosphopeptide maps.

Differences between glycogen synthases from rat and rabbit skeletal muscle as indicated by phosphopeptide maps

Glycogen synthase I was purified from rat skeletal muscle. On sodium dodecyl sulfate polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis, the enzyme migrated as a major band with a subunit Mr of 85,000. The specific activity (24 units/mg protein), activity ratio (the activity in the absence of glucose-6-P divided by the activity in the presence of glucose-6-P X 100) (92 +/- 2) and phosphate content (0.6 mol/mol subunit) were similar to the enzyme from rabbit skeletal muscle. Phosphorylation and inactivation of rat muscle glycogen synthase by casein kinase I, casein kinase II (glycogen synthase kinase 5), glycogen synthase kinase 3 (kinase FA), glycogen synthase kinase 4, phosphorylase b kinase, and the catalytic subunit of cAMP-dependent protein kinase were similar to those reported for rabbit muscle synthase. The greatest decrease in rat muscle glycogen synthase activity was seen after phosphorylation of the synthase by casein kinase I. Phosphopeptide maps of glycogen synthase were obtained by digesting the different 32P-labeled forms of glycogen synthase by CNBr, trypsin, or chymotrypsin. The CNBr peptides were separated by sodium dodecyl sulfate polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis and the tryptic and chymotryptic peptides were separated by reversed-phase HPLC. Although the rat and rabbit forms of synthase gave similar peptide maps, there were significant differences between the phosphopeptides derived from the N-terminal region of rabbit glycogen synthase and the corresponding peptides presumably derived from the N-terminal region of rat glycogen synthase. For CNBr peptides, the apparent Mr was 12,500 for rat and 12,000 for the rabbit. The tryptic peptides obtained from the two species had different retention times. A single chymotryptic peptide was produced from rat skeletal muscle glycogen synthase after phosphorylation by phosphorylase kinase whereas two peptides were obtained with the rabbit enzyme. These results indicate that the N-terminus of rabbit glycogen synthase, which contains four phosphorylatable residues (Kuret et al. (1985) Eur. J. Biochem. 151, 39-48), is different from the N-terminus of rat glycogen synthase.

Rat skeletal muscle glycogen synthase: phosphorylation of the purified enzyme by cAMP-dependent and -independent protein kinases

Glycogen synthase was purified to near homogeneity from rat skeletal muscle, and was found to resemble the rabbit skeletal muscle enzyme in several respects. An apparent molecular weight (Mapp) of 86,000 was estimated from the electrophoretic mobility of the subunit on polyacrylamide gels in the presence of sodium dodecyl sulfate. Limited proteolysis of the rat synthase with trypsin resulted in the formation of species with MappS equal to 75,000, 69,000, and 67,000. The enzyme could be phosphorylated by cAMP-dependent protein kinase, phosphorylase kinase, and the cAMP-independent protein kinases, PC0.7 and FA/GSK-3. Essentially all of the phosphorylation observed occurred on serines located in two cyanogen bromide fragments, denoted CB-1 (Mapp = 13,000) and CB-2 (Mapp = 22,000). FA/GSK-3 and cAMP-dependent protein kinase phosphorylated sites in both fragments. Phosphate introduced by phosphorylase kinase was located exclusively in CB-1, and that incorporated with PC0.7 was found in CB-2. Phosphorylation by FA/GSK-3 reduced the electrophoretic mobility of the subunit, introduced heterogeneity into CB-2, and was synergistic with phosphorylation by PC0.7. To separate phosphorylation sites more completely, samples of glycogen synthase were subjected to extensive proteolysis using trypsin, followed by reverse-phase liquid chromatography. When phosphorylated by the same kinases, the pattern of fragments obtained with rat and rabbit skeletal muscle glycogen synthase were almost identical. The results presented provide strong evidence that the subunit of rat skeletal muscle glycogen synthase has at least five phosphorylation sites that are very similar, if not identical, to sites present on the rabbit muscle enzyme.

Glycogen synthase in diabetic rat skeletal muscle: activation by insulin

Glycogen synthase in skeletal muscle of 3-day alloxan-diabetic rats was found to be in a less active state than in normal muscle. Both the activity ratio (activity without G6P divided by activity with 7.2 mM G6P at 4.4 mM UDPG, pH 7.8) and fractional velocity (activity with 0.25 mM G6P divided by activity with 10 mM G6P at 0.03 mM UDPG, pH 6.9) were significantly lower in the diabetic tissue. Correspondingly, the S0.5 for UDPG and A0.5 for G6P were significantly higher in diabetic tissue, suggesting decreased affinity for substrate and activator, respectively. The kinetic changes in the diabetic synthase were identical whether the alloxan-treated animals were maintained on insulin for 7 days prior to withdrawal for 3 days, or studied 3 days immediately after alloxan treatment. The diabetes-induced changes in synthase could be reversed by injecting the diabetic rat with insulin 10 min prior to sacrifice. After insulin treatment, the S0.5 for UDPG and A0.5 for G6P decreased to control levels or lower and the activity ratios and fractional velocities increased to control levels or higher. The activity of glycogen synthase phosphatase was not decreased in diabetic skeletal muscle. This observation, coupled with the rapid response of the diabetic synthase to in vivo insulin treatment, suggests that, unlike the phosphatase in cardiac muscle and liver, the glycogen synthase phosphatase in skeletal muscle is not altered by the diabetic state.

The role of protein phosphorylation in neural and hormonal control of cellular activity

Protein phosphorylation is now recognized to be the major general mechanism by which intracellular events in mammalian tissues are controlled by external physiological stimuli. However, only recently has the idea that different cellular functions are controlled by common protein kinases and protein phosphatases started to gain widespread acceptance. Thus there is an integrated network of regulatory pathways, mediated by phosphorylation-dephosphorylation, that allows diverse cellular events to be coordinated by neural and hormonal stimuli. The evidence that supports this concept is reviewed, with emphasis on the role of protein phosphorylation in enzyme regulation.