Adipose tissue inflammation and systemic insulin resistance in mice with diet-induced obesity is possibly associated with disruption of PFKFB3 in hematopoietic cells.

Obesity-associated inflammation in white adipose tissue (WAT) is a causal factor of systemic insulin resistance; however, precisely how immune cells regulate WAT inflammation in relation to systemic insulin resistance remains to be elucidated. The present study examined a role for 6-phosphofructo-2-kinase/fructose-2,6-bisphosphatase 3 (PFKFB3) in hematopoietic cells in regulating WAT inflammation and systemic insulin sensitivity. Male C57BL/6J mice were fed a high-fat diet (HFD) or low-fat diet (LFD) for 12 weeks and examined for WAT inducible 6-phosphofructo-2-kinase (iPFK2) content, while additional HFD-fed mice were treated with rosiglitazone and examined for PFKFB3 mRNAs in WAT stromal vascular cells (SVC). Also, chimeric mice in which PFKFB3 was disrupted only in hematopoietic cells and control chimeric mice were also fed an HFD and examined for HFD-induced WAT inflammation and systemic insulin resistance. In vitro, adipocytes were co-cultured with bone marrow-derived macrophages and examined for adipocyte proinflammatory responses and insulin signaling. Compared with their respective levels in controls, WAT iPFK2 amount in HFD-fed mice and WAT SVC PFKFB3 mRNAs in rosiglitazone-treated mice were significantly increased. When the inflammatory responses were analyzed, peritoneal macrophages from PFKFB3-disrputed mice revealed increased proinflammatory activation and decreased anti-inflammatory activation compared with control macrophages. At the whole animal level, hematopoietic cell-specific PFKFB3 disruption enhanced the effects of HFD feeding on promoting WAT inflammation, impairing WAT insulin signaling, and increasing systemic insulin resistance. In vitro, adipocytes co-cultured with PFKFB3-disrupted macrophages revealed increased proinflammatory responses and decreased insulin signaling compared with adipocytes co-cultured with control macrophages. These results suggest that PFKFB3 disruption in hematopoietic cells only exacerbates HFD-induced WAT inflammation and systemic insulin resistance.

Visit-to-visit fasting plasma glucose variability is an important risk factor for long-term changes in left cardiac structure and function in patients with type 2 diabetes.

BACKGROUND: To investigate the effect of visit-to-visit fasting plasma glucose (FPG) variability on the left cardiac structure and function in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). METHODS: In this prospective cohort study, 455 T2DM patients were included and follow-up for a median of 4.7 years. FPG measured on every hospital visit was collected. FPG variability was calculated by its coefficient of variation (CV-FPG). Left cardiac structure and function were assessed using echocardiography at baseline and after follow-up. Multivariable linear regression analyses were used to estimate the effect of FPG variability on the annualized changes in left cardiac structure and function. Subgroup analysis stratified by mean HbA1c levels (< 7% and ≥ 7%) were also performed. RESULT: In multivariable regression analyses, CV-FPG was independently associated with the annualized changes in left ventricle (ß = 0.137; P = 0.031), interventricular septum (ß = 0.215; P = 0.001), left ventricular posterior wall thickness (ß = 0.129; P = 0.048), left ventricular mass index (ß = 0.227; P < 0.001), and left ventricular ejection fraction (ß = - 0.132; P = 0.030). After additionally stratified by mean HbA1c levels, CV-FPG was still independently associated with the annualized changes in the above parameters in patients with HbA1c ≥ 7%, while not in patients with HbA1c < 7%. CONCLUSIONS: Visit-to-visit variability in FPG could be a novel risk factor for the long-term adverse changes in left cardiac structure and systolic function in patients with type 2 diabetes. Trial registration ClinicalTrials.gov (NCT02587741), October 27, 2015, retrospectively registered.

Evolution in anti-myelin oligodendrocyte glycoprotein antibody detection and its clinical significance: a narrative review.

Myelin oligodendrocyte glycoprotein (MOG) is a protein exclusively expressing on the surface of myelin sheaths and oligodendrocyte plasma membrane in the central nervous system of mammals, and it has a highly conserved nucleotide and amino acid structure between species. Evidence from animal research support that anti-MOG antibodies (MOG-Abs) are pathogenic antibodies rather than a bystander secondary to myelin destruction. Similarly, immunoglobulin-G against myelin oligodendrocyte glycoprotein (MOG-IgG) is considered a demyelinating disease-associated autoantibody in human beings. In clinical studies, several detection methods, including ELISA, immunoblot, radio immunoprecipitation assays and Cell-based assays (CBAs), have been applied in identifying MOG-Abs in idiopathic inflammatory demyelinating diseases (IIDDs) of human beings. CBAs method is recommended by many proposed diagnostic criterions for MOG-Abs-associated disorders (MOGAD). This method involves transfection of mammalian cells with MOG antigen, binding of MOG-Abs to MOG antigen, binding of secondary antibodies to MOG-Abs and quantification method. However, the reliability for CBAs systems of MOG-Abs detection can be influenced by numerous factors, such as length of MOG antigen, expression vectors, cell lines, secondary antibodies, and read-out systems. In addition, there are controversial results on the studies of IIDDs with MOG-IgG positive. Nowadays, more and more evidence suggests that patients positive for MOG-IgG share common features, but further clinical and laboratory researches are needed to clarify if MOGAD is an independent disease entity. In this review, we intend to summarize the detection methods of MOG-Abs and their sensitivity and specificity to MOGAD in human.

Adipocyte inducible 6-phosphofructo-2-kinase suppresses adipose tissue inflammation and promotes macrophage anti-inflammatory activation.

Obesity-associated inflammation in white adipose tissue (WAT) is a causal factor of systemic insulin resistance. To better understand how adipocytes regulate WAT inflammation, the present study generated chimeric mice in which inducible 6-phosphofructo-2-kinase was low, normal, or high in WAT while the expression of 6-phosphofructo-2-kinase/fructose-2,6-bisphosphatase 3 (Pfkfb3) was normal in hematopoietic cells, and analyzed changes in high-fat diet (HFD)-induced WAT inflammation and systemic insulin resistance in the mice. Indicated by proinflammatory signaling and cytokine expression, the severity of HFD-induced WAT inflammation in WT â†’ Pfkfb3+/- mice, whose Pfkfb3 was disrupted in WAT adipocytes but not hematopoietic cells, was comparable with that in WT â†’ WT mice, whose Pfkfb3 was normal in all cells. In contrast, the severity of HFD-induced WAT inflammation in WT â†’ Adi-Tg mice, whose Pfkfb3 was over-expressed in WAT adipocytes but not hematopoietic cells, remained much lower than that in WT â†’ WT mice. Additionally, HFD-induced insulin resistance was correlated with the status of WAT inflammation and comparable between WT â†’ Pfkfb3+/- mice and WT â†’ WT mice, but was significantly lower in WT â†’ Adi-Tg mice than in WT â†’ WT mice. In vitro, palmitoleate decreased macrophage phosphorylation states of Jnk p46 and Nfkb p65 and potentiated the effect of interleukin 4 on suppressing macrophage proinflammatory activation. Taken together, these results suggest that the Pfkfb3 in adipocytes functions to suppress WAT inflammation. Moreover, the role played by adipocyte Pfkfb3 is attributable to, at least in part, palmitoleate promotion of macrophage anti-inflammatory activation.

SOX10 ablation severely impairs the generation of postmigratory neural crest from human pluripotent stem cells.

Animal studies have indicated that SOX10 is one of the key transcription factors regulating the proliferation, migration and differentiation of multipotent neural crest (NC), and mutation of SOX10 in humans may lead to type 4 Waardenburg syndrome (WS). However, the exact role of SOX10 in human NC development and the underlying molecular mechanisms of SOX10-related human diseases remain poorly understood due to the lack of appropriate human model systems. In this study, we successfully generated SOX10-knockout human induced pluripotent stem cells (SOX10-/- hiPSCs) by the CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing tool. We found that loss of SOX10 significantly inhibited the generation of p75highHNK1+/CD49D+ postmigratory neural crest stem cells (NCSCs) and upregulated the cell apoptosis rate during NC commitment from hiPSCs. Moreover, we discovered that both the neuronal and glial differentiation capacities of SOX10-/- NCSCs were severely compromised. Intriguingly, we showed that SOX10-/- hiPSCs generated markedly more TFAP2C+nonneural ectoderm cells (NNE) than control hiPSCs during neural crest differentiation. Our results indicate that SOX10 is crucial for the transition of premigratory cells to migrating NC and is vital for NC survival. Taken together, these results provide new insights into the function of SOX10 in human NC development, and the SOX10-knockout hiPSC lines may serve as a valuable cell model to study the pathogenesis of SOX10-related human neurocristopathies.

Prediction and Analysis of Hub Genes in Renal Cell Carcinoma based on CFS Gene Selection Method Combined with Adaboost Algorithm.

BACKGROUND: Renal cell carcinoma (RCC) is the most common malignant tumor of the adult kidney. OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study was to identify key genes signatures during RCC and uncover their potential mechanisms. METHODS: Firstly, the gene expression profiles of GSE53757 which contained 144 samples, including 72 kidney cancer samples and 72 controls, were downloaded from the GEO database. And then differentially expressed genes (DEGs) between the kidney cancer samples and the controls were identified. After that, GO and KEGG enrichment analyses of DEGs were performed by DAVID. Furthermore, the correlation-based feature subset (CFS) method was applied to the selection of key genes of DEGs. In addition, the classification model between the kidney cancer samples and the controls was built by Adaboost based on the selected key genes. RESULTS: 213 DEGs including 80 up-regulated and 133 down-regulated genes were selected as the feature genes to build the classification model between the kidney cancer samples and the controls by CFS method. The accuracy of the classification model by using 5-folds cross-validation test and independent set test is 84.4% and 83.3%, respectively. Besides, TYROBP, CD4163, CAV1, CXCL9, CXCL11 and CXCL13 also can be found in the top 20 hub genes screened by proteinprotein interaction (PPI) network. CONCLUSION: It indicated that CFS is a useful tool to identify key genes in kidney cancer. Besides, we also predicted genes such as TYROBP, CD4163, CAV1, CXCL9, CXCL11 and CXCL13 that might target genes to diagnose the kidney cancer.

Adoptive transfer of Pfkfb3-disrupted hematopoietic cells to wild-type mice exacerbates diet-induced hepatic steatosis and inflammation.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Hepatic steatosis and inflammation are key characteristics of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD). However, whether and how hepatic steatosis and liver inflammation are differentially regulated remains to be elucidated. Considering that disruption of 6-phosphofructo-2-kinase/fructose-2,6-biphosphatase 3 (Pfkfb3/iPfk2) dissociates fat deposition and inflammation, the present study examined a role for Pfkfb3/iPfk2 in hematopoietic cells in regulating hepatic steatosis and inflammation in mice. METHODS: Pfkfb3-disrupted (Pfkfb3 +/-) mice and wild-type (WT) littermates were fed a high-fat diet (HFD) and examined for NAFLD phenotype. Also, bone marrow cells isolated from Pfkfb3 +/- mice and WT mice were differentiated into macrophages for analysis of macrophage activation status and for bone marrow transplantation (BMT) to generate chimeric (WT/BMT- Pfkfb3 +/-) mice in which Pfkfb3 was disrupted only in hematopoietic cells and control chimeric (WT/BMT-WT) mice. The latter were also fed an HFD and examined for NAFLD phenotype. In vitro, hepatocytes were co-cultured with bone marrow-derived macrophages and examined for hepatocyte fat deposition and proinflammatory responses. RESULTS: After the feeding period, HFD-fed Pfkfb3 +/- mice displayed increased severity of liver inflammation in the absence of hepatic steatosis compared with HFD-fed WT mice. When inflammatory activation was analyzed, Pfkfb3 +/- macrophages revealed increased proinflammatory activation and decreased anti-proinflammatory activation. When NAFLD phenotype was analyzed in the chimeric mice, WT/BMT-Pfkfb3 +/- mice displayed increases in the severity of HFD-induced hepatic steatosis and inflammation compared with WT/BMT-WT mice. At the cellular level, hepatocytes co-cultured with Pfkfb3 +/- macrophages revealed increased fat deposition and proinflammatory responses compared with hepatocytes co-cultured with WT macrophages. CONCLUSIONS: Pfkfb3 disruption only in hematopoietic cells exacerbates HFD-induced hepatic steatosis and inflammation whereas the Pfkfb3/iPfk2 in nonhematopoietic cells appeared to be needed for HFD feeding to induce hepatic steatosis. As such, the Pfkfb3/iPfk2 plays a unique role in regulating NAFLD pathophysiology.

Age-Specific Imbalance of Circulating Tfh Cell Subsets and Its Association With Gout-Targeted Kidney Impairment.

Objective: Gout is a chronic disease characterized by the deposition of monosodium urate (MSU) crystals in tissue. Study with a focus on adaptive immune response remains to be understood although innate immune response has been reported extensively in gout etiology. Our study attempted to investigate the association of gout-related immune cell imbalance with clinical features and comorbidity with renal impairment and the implicated pathogenesis via the assessment of T and B cell subsets in different activity phases or with immune effects combined with the analyses of clinical parameters. Methods: Fifty-eight gout patients and 56 age- and sex-matched healthy individuals were enrolled. To learn the roles of circulating T cells, a lymphocyte profile incorporating 32 T cell subsets was tested from isolated freshly peripheral blood monocyte cells (PBMCs) with multiple-color flow cytometry. Furthermore, the collected clinical features of participants were used to analyze the characteristics of these differential cell subsets. Stratified on the basis of the level of creatinine (Cr, enzymatic method), all patients were categorized into Crlow (Cr ≤ 116 µmol/L) and Crhi (Cr > 116 µmol/L) groups to exploit whether these gout-associated T cell subsets were functional in gout-targeted kidney dysfunction. The differentiation of B cells was investigated in gout patients. Results: Our results show that CD 4+ T cells, Th2 cells, and Tc2 cells were upregulated, whereas Tc17 cells were downregulated. Tfh cells skewed toward the polarization of Tfh2 cells. Specifically, Tfh2 cells increased, but Tfh1 cells decreased, accompanied with aging for gout patients, suggesting that age might trigger the skewing of Tfh1/Tfh2 cell subsets to influence gout development. Moreover, Tfh2 cells were connected to renal dysfunction as well. No alterations of B cell subsets were observed in patients when compared to controls. Conclusions: Our data demonstrate age-specific dysfunctions of Tfh1/2 cells in gout occurrence, and Tfh2 cell upregulation is associated with gout-targeted renal dysfunction. However, Tfh2 cells may function in auto-inflammatory gout independent of helping B differentiation, and an in-depth study remains to be conducted.

Generation of an induced pluripotent stem cell line (SYSUi002-A) from a patient with coronary slow flow phenomenon.

The coronary slow flow phenomenon (CSFP) is characterized by delayed progression of the injected contrast medium through the coronary tree during coronary angiography due to unknown mechanisms. Here, a human induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC) line (SYSUi002-A) was established using the Sendai-virus delivery system from dermal fibroblasts of a CSFP patient. This cell line may represent a valuable tool for investigating the pathogenesis and therapeutic strategies of CSFP.