Lipid raft microdomains act as organizing centers for signal transduction. We report here that the exocyst complex, consisting of Exo70, Sec6, and Sec8, regulates the compartmentalization of Glut4-containing vesicles at lipid raft domains in adipocytes. Exo70 is recruited by the G protein TC10 after activation by insulin and brings with it Sec6 and Sec8. Knockdowns of these proteins block insulin-stimulated glucose uptake. Moreover, their targeting to lipid rafts is required for glucose uptake and Glut4 docking at the plasma membrane. The assembly of this complex also requires the PDZ domain protein SAP97, a member of the MAGUKs family, which binds to Sec8 upon its translocation to the lipid raft. Exocyst assembly at lipid rafts sets up targeting sites for Glut4 vesicles, which transiently associate with these microdomains upon stimulation of cells with insulin. These results suggest that the TC10/exocyst complex/SAP97 axis plays an important role in the tethering of Glut4 vesicles to the plasma membrane in adipocytes.
INTRODUCTIONInsulin stimulates glucose transport in fat and muscle cells through a process of regulated vesicle recycling in which the facilitative glucose transporter Glut4 is translocated from intracellular sites to the plasma membrane (Saltiel and Kahn, 2001;Bryant et al., 2002). In unstimulated cells, Glut4 undergoes endocytosis into endosomes and subsequently sorts into specialized storage vesicles that traffic to the plasma membrane after activation of the insulin receptor. The vesicles then dock and fuse at specific sites at the membrane, resulting in extracellular exposure of the transporter. The precise signals from the insulin receptor that control these events involve the tyrosine phosphorylation of a number of intracellular substrates. These phosphorylations lead to activation of the PI3-kinase pathway (Saltiel and Kahn, 2001) and also to activation of the G protein TC10 Maffucci et al., 2003), which in turn binds to numerous effectors, including the exocyst protein Exo70 (Inoue et al., 2003). Exo70 exists in a multiprotein complex with the proteins Sec6 and Sec8. A dominant-negative mutant of Exo70 blocked insulin-stimulated glucose uptake, but was without effect on translocation of Glut4 to the plasma membrane. However, this Exo70 mutant prevented the appearance of Glut4 at the cell surface, leading us to propose that the exocyst complex may play a critical role in tethering Glut4 vesicles to the plasma membrane for subsequent docking and fusion (Inoue et al., 2003).Lipid rafts are specialized compartments of the plasma membrane enriched in cholesterol and glycosphingolipids. Numerous signaling and cytoskeletal proteins are found in these subdomains, suggesting that they may act as organizing centers for signal transduction, particularly for insulin (Anderson, 1998;Schlegel et al., 1998;Bickel, 2002; Pessin, 2002, 2003). Both the insulin receptor and TC10 reside in lipid rafts (Yamamoto et al., 1998;Gustavsson et al., 1999;Nystrom et al., 1999;Kimura et al., 2002;Vainio et al., 2002)...