• HOME
  • NEWS
  • EXPLORE
    • CAREER
      • Companies
      • Jobs
    • EVENTS
    • iGEM
      • News
      • Team
    • PHOTOS
    • VIDEO
    • WIKI
  • BLOG
  • COMMUNITY
    • FACEBOOK
    • INSTAGRAM
    • TWITTER
Monday, October 20, 2025
BIOENGINEER.ORG
No Result
View All Result
  • Login
  • HOME
  • NEWS
  • EXPLORE
    • CAREER
      • Companies
      • Jobs
        • Lecturer
        • PhD Studentship
        • Postdoc
        • Research Assistant
    • EVENTS
    • iGEM
      • News
      • Team
    • PHOTOS
    • VIDEO
    • WIKI
  • BLOG
  • COMMUNITY
    • FACEBOOK
    • INSTAGRAM
    • TWITTER
  • HOME
  • NEWS
  • EXPLORE
    • CAREER
      • Companies
      • Jobs
        • Lecturer
        • PhD Studentship
        • Postdoc
        • Research Assistant
    • EVENTS
    • iGEM
      • News
      • Team
    • PHOTOS
    • VIDEO
    • WIKI
  • BLOG
  • COMMUNITY
    • FACEBOOK
    • INSTAGRAM
    • TWITTER
No Result
View All Result
Bioengineer.org
No Result
View All Result
Home NEWS Science News Biology

Less sugar, please! New studies show low glucose levels might assist muscle repair

Bioengineer by Bioengineer
April 3, 2021
in Biology
Reading Time: 3 mins read
0
IMAGE
Share on FacebookShare on TwitterShare on LinkedinShare on RedditShare on Telegram

Skeletal muscle satellite cells found to grow better with less glucose in vitro

IMAGE

Credit: Tokyo Metropolitan University

Tokyo, Japan – Researchers from Tokyo Metropolitan University have shown that skeletal muscle satellite cells, key players in muscle repair, proliferate better in low glucose environments. This is contrary to 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 fibers. When myofiber cells get damaged, the satellite cells go into overdrive, multiplying and finally fusing with myofiber cells. This not only helps repair 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.

A team of scientists from Tokyo Metropolitan University led by Assistant Professor Yasuro Furuichi, Associate Professor Yasuko Manabe and Professor Nobuharu L Fujii have been studying how skeletal muscle satellite cells multiply outside the body. Looking at cells multiplying in petri dishes in a growth medium, they noticed that higher levels of glucose had an adverse effect on the rate at which they grew. This is counterintuitive; 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. In experiments in high glucose media, cultures of satellite cells always ended up as a mixture, simply due to other cell types in the original sample also multiplying. By keeping the glucose levels low, they were able to create a situation where satellite cells could proliferate, but other cell types could not, giving a very pure culture of skeletal muscle satellite cells. This is a key prerequisite for studying these cells in a variety of settings, including regenerative medicine. So, was the amount of glucose in their original experiment somehow “just right”? 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.

The team notes that the sugar levels used in previous experiments matched those found in diabetics. This might explain why loss of muscle mass is seen in diabetic patients, and may have significant implications for how we might keep our muscles healthier for longer.

###

This work was supported by JSPS KAKENHI Grants-in-Aid of Scientific Research (18K19751, 20H04079, 17H02159, 18H04086), Sumitomo Dainippon Pharma Co., Ltd., and the Uehara Memorial Foundation.

Media Contact
Go Totsukawa
[email protected]

Related Journal Article

http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fcell.2021.640399

Tags: AgingBiologyCell BiologyGerontologyHealth Care Systems/ServicesMedicine/HealthMolecular BiologyNutrition/NutrientsSports Medicine
Share13Tweet8Share2ShareShareShare2

Related Posts

blank

Identifying Superior Walnut Genotypes in the Himalayas

October 20, 2025
Leptin-Sensing Brain Circuit Reduces Anxiety to Support Essential Behaviors: Eating, Exploring, and Resting

Leptin-Sensing Brain Circuit Reduces Anxiety to Support Essential Behaviors: Eating, Exploring, and Resting

October 20, 2025

Prenatal BPA Alters YY1 and Affects Offspring Brain

October 20, 2025

GABA Protects Colorectal Cancer Cells from Cortisol Damage

October 20, 2025
Please login to join discussion

POPULAR NEWS

  • Sperm MicroRNAs: Crucial Mediators of Paternal Exercise Capacity Transmission

    1265 shares
    Share 505 Tweet 316
  • Stinkbug Leg Organ Hosts Symbiotic Fungi That Protect Eggs from Parasitic Wasps

    298 shares
    Share 119 Tweet 75
  • New Study Suggests ALS and MS May Stem from Common Environmental Factor

    127 shares
    Share 51 Tweet 32
  • New Study Indicates Children’s Risk of Long COVID Could Double Following a Second Infection – The Lancet Infectious Diseases

    103 shares
    Share 41 Tweet 26

About

We bring you the latest biotechnology news from best research centers and universities around the world. Check our website.

Follow us

Recent News

Identifying Superior Walnut Genotypes in the Himalayas

Oxytocin Controls Heart Rate via Brain Pathway

AASM Reveals Finalists for Inaugural Sleep Medicine Disruptors Innovation Award

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 66 other subscribers
  • Contact Us

Bioengineer.org © Copyright 2023 All Rights Reserved.

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password?

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In
No Result
View All Result
  • Homepages
    • Home Page 1
    • Home Page 2
  • News
  • National
  • Business
  • Health
  • Lifestyle
  • Science

Bioengineer.org © Copyright 2023 All Rights Reserved.