Low glucose keeps muscles healthy: Study

Researchers have shown that skeletal muscle satellite cells, key players in muscle repair, proliferate better in low glucose environments.

A new study has revealed a new benefit of keeping sugar at bay. Researchers have shown that skeletal muscle satellite cells, key players in muscle repair, proliferate better in low glucose environments.

This is contrary to the conventional wisdom that says mammalian cells fare better when there is more sugar to fuel their activities. Because ultra-low glucose environments do not allow other cell types to proliferate, the team could produce pure cultures of satellite cells, potentially a significant boost for biomedical research.

Healthy muscles are an important part of a healthy life. With the wear and tear of everyday use, our muscles continuously repair themselves to keep them in top condition. In recent years, scientists have begun to understand how muscle repair works at the cellular level.

Skeletal muscle satellite cells have been found to be particularly important, a special type of stem cell that resides between the two layers of sheathing, the sarcolemma, and basal lamina, that envelopes myofiber cells in individual muscle fibres. When myofiber cells get damaged, the satellite cells go into overdrive, multiplying and finally fusing with myofiber cells.

This not only helps repair the damage but also maintains muscle mass. To understand how we lose muscles due to illness, inactivity, or age, getting to grips with the specific mechanisms involved is a key challenge for medical science.

Scientists from Tokyo Metropolitan University noticed that higher levels of glucose had an adverse effect on the rate at which they grew. This is counterintuitive as glucose is considered to be essential for cellular growth. It is converted into ATP, the fuel that drives a lot of cellular activity. Yet, the team confirmed that lower glucose media led to a larger number of cells, with all the biochemical markers expected for greater degrees of cell proliferation.

They also confirmed that this doesn’t apply to all cells, something they successfully managed to use to their advantage.

The team added glucose oxidase, a glucose digesting enzyme, to get to even lower levels of glucose, and grew the satellite cells in this glucose-depleted medium. Shockingly, the cells seemed to fare just fine and proliferated normally.

The conclusion is that these particular stem cells seem to derive their energy from a completely different source. Work is ongoing to try to pin down what this is. This might also explain why the loss of muscle mass is seen in diabetic patients.

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