The mechanisms underpinning decreased skeletal muscle strength and slowing of movement during aging are ill-defined. "Inflammaging," increased inflammation with advancing age, may contribute to aspects of sarcopenia, but little is known about the participatory immune components. We discovered that aging was associated with increased caspase-1 activity in mouse skeletal muscle. We hypothesized that the caspase-1-containing NLRP3 inflammasome contributes to sarcopenia in mice. Male C57BL/6J wild-type (WT) and NLRP3 mice were aged to 10 (adult) and 24 mo (old). NLRP3 mice were protected from decreased muscle mass (relative to body mass) and decreased size of type IIB and IIA myofibers, which occurred between 10 and 24 mo of age in WT mice. Old NLRP3 mice also had increased relative muscle strength and endurance and were protected from age-related increases in the number of myopathic fibers. We found no evidence of age-related or NLRP3-dependent changes in markers of systemic inflammation. Increased caspase-1 activity was associated with GAPDH proteolysis and reduced GAPDH enzymatic activity in skeletal muscles from old WT mice. Aging did not alter caspase-1 activity, GAPDH proteolysis, or GAPDH activity in skeletal muscles of NLRP3 mice. Our results show that the NLRP3 inflammasome participates in age-related loss of muscle glycolytic potential. Deletion of NLRP3 mitigates both the decline in glycolytic myofiber size and the reduced activity of glycolytic enzymes in muscle during aging. We propose that the etiology of sarcopenia involves direct communication between immune responses and metabolic flux in skeletal muscle.

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Interleukin-15 (IL-15) is a pleotropic cytokine that has a profound effect on the proliferation, survival and differentiation of many distinct cell types. The IL-15 receptor complex has 3 subunits: the unique receptor chain IL-15 receptor alpha (IL-15Rα), and two receptor chains shared with interleukin-2 (IL-2) and/or other cytokines, referred to as IL-2 receptor beta (IL-2Rβ) and IL-2 receptor gamma/gamma common chain (IL-2Rγ/γc), respectively. To our knowledge, this is the first study to examine the effects of IL-15 in immortalized human cardiomyocytes. Data collected by RT-PCR shows mRNA expression of IL-15Rα, IL-2Rβ and IL-2 Rγ/γc in these cells. Additionally, western blotting for IL-15Rα, IL-2Rβ and IL-2 Rγ/γc confirms the presence of all three IL-15 receptors. Early experiments examining the effect of IL-15 on cardiomyocyte cell survival show a statistically significant protective effect of IL-15 on the survival of cells exposed to tunicamycin, a pharamacological endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress inducing agent. These findings suggest that IL-15 signaling may be an important cardioprotective pathway that is involved in the cardiac ER stress response. As ER stress is a major component of multiple different cardiac pathologies, such as myocardial infarction, heart failure and diabetes, uncovering the molecular mechanism by which IL-15 protects the heart will allow for deeper understanding of the cardiac ER stress response.