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Altered energy balance and insulin resistance are important characteristics of aging. Skeletal muscle is a major site of glucose disposal, and the role of aging-associated inflammation in skeletal muscle insulin resistance remains unclear. To investigate, we examined glucose metabolism in 18-mo-old transgenic mice with muscle-specific overexpression of IL-10 (MIL10) and in wild-type mice during hyperinsulinemic–euglycemic clamping. Despite similar fat mass and energy balance, MIL10 mice were protected from aging-associated insulin resistance with significant increases in glucose infusion rates, whole-body glucose turnover, and skeletal muscle glucose uptake (∼60%; P < 0.05), as compared to age-matched WT mice. This protective effect was associated with decreased muscle inflammation, but no changes in adipose tissue inflammation in aging MIL10 mice. These results demonstrate the importance of skeletal muscle inflammation in aging-mediated insulin resistance, and our findings further implicate a potential therapeutic role of anti-inflammatory cytokine in the treatment of aging-mediated insulin resistance.—Dagdeviren, S., Jung, D. Y., Friedline, R. H., Noh, H. L., Kim, J. H., Patel, P. R., Tsitsilianos, N., Inashima, K., Tran, D. A., Hu, X., Loubato, M. M., Craige, S. M., Kwon, J. Y., Lee, K. W., Kim, J. K. IL-10 prevents aging-associated inflammation and insulin resistance in skeletal muscle.

A 37-year-old woman presented to us for the complaints of pain and swelling over her right side of the neck and high spiking fever for the last 3 days. Her previous medical history was significant for intravenous drug abuse and she reported injecting heroin and methamphetamine by mixing with tap

A 47-year-old man with history of intravenous drug abuse presented to the emergency room complaining of worsening right-sided pelvic swelling and difficulty in walking for the last 2 weeks. Two months before, he had been admitted for methicillin resistant staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) hip septic

Obesity is characterized by a dysregulated immune system, which may causally associate with insulin resistance and type 2 diabetes. Despite widespread use of nonobese diabetic (NOD) mice, NOD with severe combined immunodeficiency (scid) mutation (SCID) mice, and SCID bearing a null mutation in the IL-2 common γ chain receptor (NSG) mice as animal models of human diseases including type 1 diabetes, the underlying metabolic effects of a genetically altered immune system are poorly understood. For this, we performed a comprehensive metabolic characterization of these mice fed chow or after 6 wk of a high-fat diet. We found that NOD mice had ∼50% less fat mass and were 2-fold more insulin sensitive, as measured by hyperinsulinemic-euglycemic clamp, than C57BL/6 wild-type mice. SCID mice were also more insulin sensitive with increased muscle glucose metabolism and resistant to diet-induced obesity due to increased energy expenditure (∼10%) and physical activity (∼40%) as measured by metabolic cages. NSG mice were completely protected from diet-induced obesity and insulin resistance with significant increases in glucose metabolism in peripheral organs. Our findings demonstrate an important role of genetic background, lymphocytes, and cytokine signaling in diet-induced obesity and insulin resistance.—Friedline, R. H., Ko, H. J., Jung, D. Y., Lee, Y., Bortell, R., Dagdeviren, S., Patel, P. R., Hu, X., Inashima, K., Kearns, C., Tsitsilianos, N., Shafiq, U., Shultz, L. D., Lee, K. W., Greiner, D. L., Kim, J. K. Genetic ablation of lymphocytes and cytokine signaling in nonobese diabetic mice prevents diet-induced obesity and insulin resistance.

Insulin resistance is a major characteristic of obesity and type 2 diabetes, but the underlying mechanism is unclear. Recent studies have shown a metabolic role of capsaicin that may be mediated via the transient receptor potential vanilloid type-1 (TRPV1) channel. In this study, TRPV1 knockout (KO) and wild-type (WT) mice (as controls) were fed a high-fat diet (HFD), and metabolic studies were performed to measure insulin and leptin action. The TRPV1 KO mice became more obese than the WT mice after HFD, partly attributed to altered energy balance and leptin resistance in the KO mice. The hyperinsulinemic-euglycemic clamp experiment showed that the TRPV1 KO mice were more insulin resistant after HFD because of the ∼40% reduction in glucose metabolism in the white and brown adipose tissue, compared with that in the WT mice. Leptin treatment failed to suppress food intake, and leptin-mediated hypothalamic signal transducer and activator of transcription (STAT)-3 activity was blunted in the TRPV1 KO mice. We also found that the TRPV1 KO mice were more obese and insulin resistant than the WT mice at 9 mo of age. Taken together, these results indicate that lacking TRPV1 exacerbates the obesity and insulin resistance associated with an HFD and aging, and our findings further suggest that TRPV1 has a major role in regulating glucose metabolism and hypothalamic leptin’s effects in obesity.—Lee, E., Jung, D. Y., Kim, J. H., Patel, P. R., Hu, X., Lee, Y., Azuma, Y., Wang, H.-F., Tsitsilianos, N., Shafiq, U., Kwon, J. Y., Lee, H. J., Lee, K. W., Kim, J. K. Transient receptor potential vanilloid type-1 channel regulates diet-induced obesity, insulin resistance, and leptin resistance.

TRPM2 Ca2+-permeable cation channel is widely expressed and activated by markers of cellular stress. Since inflammation and stress play a major role in insulin resistance, we examined the role of TRPM2 Ca2+ channel in glucose metabolism. A 2-h hyperinsulinemic euglycemic clamp was performed in TRPM2-deficient (KO) and wild-type mice to assess insulin sensitivity. To examine the effects of diet-induced obesity, mice were fed a high-fat diet for 4–10 mo, and metabolic cage and clamp studies were conducted in conscious mice. TRPM2-KO mice were more insulin sensitive partly because of increased glucose metabolism in peripheral organs. After 4 mo of high-fat feeding, TRPM2-KO mice were resistant to diet-induced obesity, and this was associated with increased energy expenditure and elevated expressions of PGC-1α, PGC-1β, PPARα, ERRα, TFAM, and MCAD in white adipose tissue. Hyperinsulinemic euglycemic clamps showed that TRPM2-KO mice were more insulin sensitive, with increased Akt and GSK-3β phosphorylation in heart. Obesity-mediated inflammation in adipose tissue and liver was attenuated in TRPM2-KO mice. Overall, TRPM2 deletion protected mice from developing diet-induced obesity and insulin resistance. Our findings identify a novel role of TRPM2 Ca2+ channel in the regulation of energy expenditure, inflammation, and insulin resistance.

Skeletal muscle insulin resistance is a major characteristic of obesity and type 2 diabetes. Although obesity-mediated inflammation is causally associated with insulin resistance, the underlying mechanism is unclear. Here, we examined the effects of chronic obesity in mice with muscle-specific overexpression of interleukin-10 (MIL10). After 16 weeks of a high-fat diet (HFD), MIL10 mice became markedly obese but showed improved insulin action compared to that of wild-type mice, which was largely due to increased glucose metabolism and reduced inflammation in skeletal muscle. Since leptin regulates inflammation, the beneficial effects of interleukin-10 (IL-10) were further examined in leptin-deficient ob/ob mice. Muscle-specific overexpression of IL-10 in ob/ob mice (MCK-IL10ob/ob) did not affect spontaneous obesity, but MCK-IL10ob/ob mice showed increased glucose turnover compared to that in ob/ob mice. Last, mice with muscle-specific ablation of IL-10 receptor (M-IL10R-/-) were generated to determine whether IL-10 signaling in skeletal muscle is involved in IL-10 effects on glucose metabolism. After an HFD, M-IL10R-/- mice developed insulin resistance with reduced glucose metabolism compared to that in wild-type mice. Overall, these results demonstrate IL-10 effects to attenuate obesity-mediated inflammation and improve insulin sensitivity in skeletal muscle, and our findings implicate a potential therapeutic role of anti-inflammatory cytokines in treating insulin resistance and type 2 diabetes.