Research: Metabolic Properties of Muscle Fibers

Geschatte leestijd: 2 minuten New breakthrough in research on the metabolic properties of muscle fibers. Or more specifically; The role of the AMPK protein in muscle glucose consumption. Thus, it offers new insights into treatment methods for diabetes and obesity.

Glucose and Muscle Fibers

Metabolic diseases such as diabetes are a disruption of the way your body handles energy. This process consists of many factors. One of those factors is the consumption of glucose by the muscles. Muscles are a large reservoir of glucose in the form of glycogen. They are also the largest consumers of sugars and fats. AMPK is a small but very important protein in muscle fibers. It acts as a sort of fuel gauge that tells cells how much energy is available. “It is therefore also called the energy sensor of the cell,” says Jimmy Bagley of San Francisco State University. When AMPK is not activated, it becomes more difficult to regulate your blood sugar. This often happens in people who store too much energy, exercise too little, and are overweight. Bagley and his colleagues from CSU Fullerton were the first to succeed in analyzing individual muscle fibers for AMPK [1]. They developed a new technique for this, which was published in the Journal of Applied Physiology. Bagley’s Muscle Physiology Laboratory manually isolated individual muscle fibers, about half the thickness of a hair. They used special microscopes, tweezers, and chemical solutions for this purpose. This allowed them to determine the type of muscle fiber it was and prepare each muscle fiber for protein analysis. The muscle fibers were then taken to CSU Fullerton where they were analyzed with a new device called Protein Simple. This way, they are able to see with high precision what happens to the AMPK protein in individual muscle cells.

Effect of Training on Muscle Fiber Measurement

According to the researchers, this is much more accurate than previous methods where a sample of the tissue was taken and ground into a whole. The analysis was then performed on that one large sample. This sample contains, among other things, muscle cells, fat cells, stem cells, and blood vessels that can contaminate the data. Many studies focused on diabetes have focused on fat cells in the pancreas and other organs. However, muscles are the largest reservoir of sugars in the body, says Bagley. More research should therefore focus on making muscles consume more sugars. The activation of AMPK is one of the ways to do this.

Customized Training Schedule

By looking at the response of the muscle fiber to training in this way, it can be assessed whether the muscle responds by consuming more sugar. If not, other training methods can be tried. It certainly offers more customization in determining the most suitable training program in preventing or treating diabetes. In addition, in this way, the effect of medication aimed at this goal could also be tested. This type of diagnostic tool can provide more insight into what exactly is achieved in the body through training. This not only leads to more effective training programs but also prevents a lot of unnecessary discussion in the gym.

Sources

news.sfsu.edu/news-story/breakthrough-sf-state-kinesiologists-studying-metabolic-protein