Summary: Although AIMP3/p18 is normally associated with the macromolecular tRNA synthetase complex, recent reports have revealed a new role of AIMP3 in tumor suppression. In this study, we generated a transgenic mouse that overexpresses AIMP3 and characterized the associated phenotype in vivo and in vitro. Surprisingly, the AIMP3 transgenic mouse exhibited a progeroid phenotype, and the cells that overexpressed AIMP3 showed accelerated senescence and defects in nuclear morphology. We found that overexpression of AIMP3 resulted in proteasome‐dependent degradation of mature lamin A, but not of lamin C, prelamin A, or progerin. The resulting imbalance in the protein levels of lamin A isoforms, namely altered stoichiometry of prelamin A and progerin to lamin A, appeared to be responsible for a phenotype that resembled progeria. An increase in the level of endogenous AIMP3 has been observed in aged human tissues and cells. The findings in this report suggest that AIMP3 is a specific regulator of mature lamin A and imply that enhanced expression of AIMP3 might be a factor driving cellular and/or organismal aging.

Diabetes mellitus in early pregnancy can cause neural tube defects (NTDs) in embryos by perturbing protein activity, causing cellular stress, and increasing programmed cell death (apoptosis) in the tissues required for neurulation. Hyperglycemia augments a branch pathway in glycolysis, the hexosamine biosynthetic pathway (HBP), to increase uridine diphosphate-N-acetylglucosamine (UDP-GlcNAc). GlcNAc can be added to proteins by O-GlcNAc transferase (OGT) to regulate protein activity. In the embryos of diabetic mice, OGT is highly activated in association with increases in global protein O-GlcNAcylation. In neural stem cells in vitro, high glucose elevates O-GlcNAcylation and reactive oxygen species, but the elevations can be suppressed by an OGT inhibitor. Inhibition of OGT in diabetic pregnant mice in vivo decreases NTD rate in the embryos. This effect is associated with reduction in global O-GlcNAcylation, alleviation of intracellular stress, and decreases in apoptosis in the embryos. These suggest that OGT plays an important role in diabetic embryopathy via increasing protein O-GlcNAcylation, and that inhibiting OGT could be a candidate approach to prevent birth defects in diabetic pregnancies.

Without zinc, pancreatic beta cells cannot either assemble insulin molecules or precipitate insulin crystals; thus, a lack of zinc concentration in the beta cells would result in a decreased insulin production. ZIP8 is one of the zinc uptake transporters involved in zinc influx into the cytosol of beta cells. Thus, if ZIP8 is down-regulated, a decreased insulin production would result. We assumed that intermittent hypoxic exposure to the beta cells may result in a decreased production of insulin due to a lack of zinc. To test this hypothesis we harvested pancreatic islets from the rats conditioned under intermittent hypoxia (IH) (fluctuating between 20.5% and 10% every 4 min for 1 h) and compared the results with those from control animals and islets. We also compared their insulin and glucose homeostasis using glucose tolerance tests (GTT) after 3 weeks. GTT results show a significant delay (P<0.05) in recovery of the blood glucose level in IH treated pups. ZIP8 expression in the beta cell membrane was down-regulated. The zinc concentration in the cell as well as insulin production was significantly decreased in the islets harvested from IH animals. However, mRNA for insulin and C-peptide/insulin protein levels in the total cell lysates remained the same as those of controls. When we treated the beta cells using siRNA mediated ZIP8, we observed the commensurate results from the IH-treated islets. We conclude that a transient IH exposure could knockdown ZIP8 transporters at mRNA as well as protein levels in the beta cells, which would decrease the level of blood insulin. However, the transcriptional activity of insulin remains the same. We conclude that the precipitation process of insulin crystal may be disturbed by a lack of zinc in the cytosol that is modulated by mainly ZIP8 after IH exposure.

This initial report presents a neonatal rat model with exposure to a transient intermittent hypoxia (IH), which results in a persisting diabetes-like condition in the young rats. Twenty-five male pups were treated at postnatal day 1 with IH exposure by alternating the level of oxygen between 10.3% and 20.8% for 5h. The treated animals were then maintained in normal ambient oxygen condition for 3 week and compared to age-matched controls. The IH treated animals exhibited a significantly higher fasting glucose level than the control animals (237.00 ± 19.66 mg/dL vs. 167.25 ± 2.95 mg/dL; P=0.003); and a significantly lower insulin level than the control (807.0 ± 72.5 pg/mL vs. 1839.8 ± 377.6 pg/mL; P=0.023). There was no difference in the mass or the number of insulin producing beta cells as well as no indicative of inflammatory changes; however, glucose tolerance tests showed a significantly disturbed glucose homeostasis. In addition, the amount of C-peptide secreted from the islets harvested from the IH animals were decreased significantly (from 914 pM in control to 809 pM in IH; P=0.0006) as well. These observations demonstrate that the neonatal exposure to the IH regimen initiates the development of deregulation in glucose homeostasis without infiltration of inflammatory cells.

A brief intermittent hypoxia (IH, ambient O₂ levels alternating between room air and 12% O₂) for 1 h immediately after birth resulted in pancreatic islet dysfunction associated with zinc deficiency as previously reported. We hypothesized that IH exposure modulates zinc homeostasis in bone as well, which leads to increased bone fragility. To test this hypothesis, we used neonatal rats and human osteoblasts (HObs). To examine IH influences on osteoblasts devoid of neural influences, we quantified amounts of alkaline phosphatase and mineralization in IH-treated HObs. Bones harvested from IH-treated animals showed significantly reduced hardness and elasticity. The IH group also showed discretely decreased levels of alkaline phosphatase and mineralization amounts. The IH group showed a decreased expression of ZIP8 or Zrt and Irt-like protein 8 (a zinc uptake transporter), Runx2 (or Runt-related transcription factor 2, a master protein in bone formation), Collagen-1 (a major protein comprising the extracellular matrix of the bone), osteocalcin, and zinc content. When zinc was eliminated from the media containing HObs using a zinc chelate and added later with zinc sulfate, Runx2, ZIP8, and osteocalcin expression decreased first, and recovered with zinc supplementation. Adenovirus-mediated ZIP8 over-expression in osteoblasts increased mineralization significantly as well. We conclude that IH impairs zinc homeostasis in bones and osteoblasts, and that such disturbances decrease bone strength, which can be recovered by zinc supplementation.