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| Author(s): |
Flávia Gerelli Ghiraldini
Total Authors: 1
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| Document type: | Doctoral Thesis |
| Press: | Campinas, SP. |
| Institution: | Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP). Instituto de Biologia |
| Defense date: | 0000-00-00 |
| Examining board members: |
Maria Luiza Silveira Mello;
Luis Fernando Barbisan;
Luciana Bolsoni Lourenço;
Mateus Mondin;
Roger Frigério Castilho
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| Advisor: | Maria Luiza Silveira Mello |
| Abstract | |
Diabetes mellitus type I (DM1) is characterized by insulitis and consequent hyperglycemia and polyuria. Structural and metabolic changes in the cell caused by hyperglycemia might induce an early-ageing phenotype. Both intrinsic and extrinsic agents might contribute to cellular ageing thus leading to chromatin structural changes and differential gene expression. Sirtuins, NAD+-dependent deacetilases, play a role in cell metabolism, transcription, DNA repair and chromatin remodeling. Sirt1 and Sirt6, especially, are nuclear proteins related to early-ageing, glucose metabolism and inflammatory response. The general purpose of the present work was to compare processes of chromatin remodeling in hepatocytes under the effects of hyperglycemia and aging, using mouse models. A model using cells in culture (HepG2) was also used to study the effects caused by hyperglycemia. The methodology used involved morphological and molecular analysis. An increase in DNA content and chromatin accessibility to MNAse was found more pronounced in hepatocytes from DM1 than from aged mice. Despite the high abundance of Sirt1 in DM1 animals, its activity was not proportionally high, whereas in old animals there was a reduction in these parameters, increasing the acetylation of Sirt1-histonic sites. In DM1 mice, Sirt6 presented similar abundance as Sirt1, possibly due to the high DNA fragmentation, different to what was found in aged animals. Both DM1 and normoglycemic old mice presented a decrease in AgNOR+ area/nuclear area ratio. While in DM1 animals it was a result from the increase in nuclear area, in old animals it was a combination of increased nuclear areas and decreased AgNOR+ areas. The DNA methylation increase in the 18S rDNA region and the decrease in Sirt7 abundance in the hepatocytes from old mice support the hypothesis of diminished cellular metabolism. Differential expression analysis for DM1 and old mouse hepatocytes presented a high number of genes involved in the inflammatory response. While in the former it could be an autoimmune characteristic of the disease, in the latter it might be an evidence of inflammatory state naturally associated with aging. Moreover, DM1 mice also presented differential gene expression related to lipid metabolism, which could contribute to increase lipid peroxidation and ROS production leading to hepatic steatosis. HepG2 cells showed changes in Apoe, Igfbp1 and Foxo1 expression in hyperglycemic medium and they were reverted when the cells returned to normoglycemic medium. The epigenetic marks, however, presented a progressive decrease in abundance, indicative of a hyperglycemic memory, which was not observed in DM1 animals. The nuclear phenotype in HepG2 cells under these same experimental conditions indicated a possible induction in cellular proliferation when the cells were returned to the normoglycemic medium. Inhibition of sirtuins increased the contrast between condensed and non-condensed chromatin and the Feulgen-DNA content, indicating a role in cell division and chromatin remodeling. Therefore, DM1 and ageing cannot be considered as identical processes, because while in DM1 there is a compensatory mechanism that induces changes in epigenetic marks, chromatin remodeling and differential gene expression, there is a general decrease in cell metabolism under aging that leads to different changes in the same parameters (AU) | |