Compartmentalization of protein traffic in insulin-sensitive cells. Kandror, Konstantin V., and Paul F. Pilch. Boston University Medical School, 80 East Concord Street, Boston, MA 02118
APStracts 3:0054E, 1996.
Insulin-sensitive cells, adipocytes and myocytes, translocate a number of intracellular proteins to the cell surface in response to insulin. Among these proteins are glucose transporters 1 and 4, receptors for IGF-II/Man-6-P and transferrin, the aminopeptidase gp160, caveolin, and a few others. In the case of insulin-activated glucose transport, this translocation has been proven to be the major, if not the only regulatory mechanism of this process. It seems likely that the cell surface recruitment of the IGF-II/Man-6-P and transferrin receptors also serves the nutritional needs of cells, whereas the physiological role of the aminopeptidase gp160 remains uncertain. Analysis of the compartmentalization and trafficking pathways of translocatable proteins in fat cells identified more than one population of recycling vesicles, although all have identical sedimentation coefficients and buoyant densities in vitro. GLUT4-containing vesicles include essentially all the intracellular GLUT4, gp160, and the acutely recycling populations of receptors for IGF-II/Man-6-P and transferrin. Besides these proteins which can be considered as vesicle "cargo", GLUT4-containing vesicles have other components, like Scamps, Rab(s), and VAMP/cellubrevin which are ubiquitous to secretory vesicles and granules from different tissues. GLUT1 and caveolin are excluded from GLUT4-containing vesicles and form different vesicular populations of unknown polypeptide composition. In skeletal muscle, two independent populations of GLUT4-containing vesicles are found: insulin-sensitive and exercise -sensitive which explains the additive effect of insulin and exercise on glucose uptake. Both vesicular populations are similar to each other and to analogous vesicles in fat cells.

Received 11 December 1995; accepted in final form 22 February
1996.
APS Manuscript Number E578-5.
Article publication pending Am. J. Physiol. (Endocrinol. Metab.).
ISSN 1080-4757 Copyright 1996 The American Physiological Society.
Published in APStracts on 20 March 96