Glucokinase (GK) plays a key role in the control of blood glucose homeostasis. We identified a small molecule GK activator, compound A, that increased the glucose affinity and maximal velocity (V max ) of GK. Compound A augmented insulin secretion from isolated rat islets and enhanced glucose utilization in primary cultured rat hepatocytes. In rat oral glucose tolerance tests, orally administrated compound A lowered plasma glucose elevation with a concomitant increase in plasma insulin and hepatic glycogen. In liver, GK activity is acutely controlled by its association to the glucokinase regulatory protein (GKRP). In order to decipher the molecular aspects of how GK activator affects the shuttling of GK between nucleus and cytoplasm, the effect of compound A on GK-GKRP interaction was further investigated. Compound A increased the level of cytoplasmic GK in both isolated rat primary hepatocytes and the liver tissues from rats. Experiments in a cell-free system revealed that compound A interacted with glucose-bound free GK, thereby impairing the association of GK and GKRP. On the other hand, compound A did not bind to glucose-unbound GK or GKRPassociated GK. Furthermore, we found that glucose-dependent GK-GKRP interaction also required ATP. Given the combined prominent role of GK on insulin secretion and hepatic glucose metabolism where the GK-GKRP mechanism is involved, activation of GK has a new therapeutic potential in the treatment of type 2 diabetes.There are three key aspects of type 2 diabetes pathogenesis, which are the focus of current and future therapies: insulin resistance, defective insulin secretion, and increased hepatic glucose production. Glucokinase (GK) 2 is the predominant glucose phosphorylation enzyme in pancreatic ␤-cells and hepatocytes. GK plays an important role as a glucose sensor for controlling plasma glucose homeostasis by enhancing insulin secretion from pancreatic ␤-cells and glucose metabolism in the liver (1, 2), which provides rational expectations that enhancement of GK activity would be a novel therapeutic strategy for type 2 diabetes. Consistent with this rationale, recently discovered small molecule allosteric activators of GK have been demonstrated to have antidiabetic efficacy in rodents (3, 4).To investigate the mechanism of action of GK activators, the interaction between GK and glucokinase regulatory protein (GKRP) is a key aspect. It is well known that hepatic GK activity is modulated by the endogenous inhibitor, glucokinase regulatory protein (GKRP) (5-8). GK is localized in the nucleus as an inactive complex with GKRP at low glucose concentrations and is dissociated from the GK⅐GKRP complex and translocated to the cytoplasm at high glucose concentrations, which triggers glucose disposal (9). Modulators of the GK-GKRP interaction have been shown to enhance hepatic glucose disposal (7). We recently solved the co-crystal structure of hepatic GK complex with GK activator, in which GK undergoes a large conformational change between the active and inactive forms at diffe...

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Kadotani A, Tsuchiya Y, Hatakeyama H, Katagiri H, Kanzaki M. Different impacts of saturated and unsaturated free fatty acids on COX-2 expression in C2C12 myotubes.

Nedachi T, Kadotani A, Ariga M, Katagiri H, Kanzaki M. Ambient glucose levels qualify the potency of insulin myogenic actions by regulating SIRT1 and FoxO3a in C 2C12 myocytes. Am J Physiol Endocrinol Metab 294: E668-E678, 2008. First published January 29, 2008 doi:10.1152/ajpendo.00640.2007.-Nutrition availability is one of the major environmental signals influencing cell fate, such as proliferation, differentiation, and apoptosis, often functioning in concert with other humoral factors, including insulin. Herein, we show that low-serum-induced differentiation of C 2C12 myocytes is significantly hampered under low glucose (LG; 5 mM) compared with high glucose (HG; 22.5 mM) conditions, concurrently with nuclear accumulation of SIRT1, an NAD ϩ -dependent deacetylase, and FoxO3a, both of which are implicated in the negative regulation of myogenesis. Intriguingly, insulin appears to exert opposite actions, depending on glucose availability, with regard to the regulation of SIRT1 and FoxO3a abundance, which apparently contributes to modulating the potency of insulin's myogenic action. Namely, insulin exerts a potent myogenic effect in the presence of sufficient glucose, whereas insulin is unable to exert its myogenic action under LG conditions, since insulin evokes massive upregulation of both SIRT1 and FoxO3a in the absence of sufficient ambient glucose. In addition, the hampered differentiation state under LG is significantly restored by sirtinol, a SIRT1 inhibitor, whereas insulin abolished this sirtinoldependent restoration, indicating that insulin can function as a negative as well as a positive myogenic factor depending on glucose availability. Taken together, our data reveal the importance of ambient glucose levels in the regulation of myogenesis and also in the determination of insulin's myogenic potency, which is achieved, at least in part, through regulation of the cellular contents and localization of SIRT1 and FoxO3a in differentiating C 2C12 myocytes.forkhead box O; differentiation SKELETAL MUSCLE CELLS have provided a useful model for exploring the molecular mechanisms involved in cellular differentiation (13), and insulin and insulin-like growth factors (IGFs) have been implicated in the process of myogenesis by activating the IRS-PI 3-kinase signaling pathway (7,22,25,53) that also serves as a pivotal intracellular signal for exerting metabolic actions in mature skeletal muscle (9). However, despite our general understanding of the effects of ambient glucose levels on insulin responsiveness with regard to metabolic actions in skeletal muscle cells (37), the possible interrelationship between glucose and insulin acting on myogenesis remains to be clarified.Skeletal muscle differentiation is a well-organized process governed by muscle-specific transcription factors belonging to the MyoD family, such as MyoD and myogenin (42), and the myocyte enhancer factor-2 (MEF2) family, such as MEF2A and MEF2C (35). In addition to these muscle-specific transcription factors, positively regulating myogenesis, the f...