细胞技术

Adipocytes express the three major types of adrenoceptors (ARs), α1-, α2-, and β-ARs, each of them being further divided into three subtypes. With the exception of α1A-, α1B-, and α1D-ARs, which have not been described to directly influence cAMP production in fat cells, all the other AR subtypes are known to ...

As a result of their poor aqueous solubility, Fatty acids (FAs) are quantitatively bound to plasma albumin in the circulation and to cytosolic FA-binding proteins inside the cell. The presence of FA-binding proteins on both sides of the plasma membrane complicates interpretation of FA upta ...

The uniqueness of the adipose cell type must be considered before choosing a procedure for gene transfer into mature adipocytes. Because adipocytes isolated from adipose tissue (AT) are filled with so many lipids that cells cannot be plated on a culture support, because of their low density, and b ...

Glucose enters the cell by a carrier-mediated, facilitated diffusion mechanism, which, in most tissues, exhibits no energy or counter-ion requirements. In adipose tissues and skeletal muscle, glucose entry is acutely regulated by insulin and other hormones (1,2). Indeed, in those tissu ...

Cyclic nucleotide phosphodiesterases (PDEs) include a large group of structurally related enzymes that are responsible for the hydrolysis of cyclic adenosine monophosphate (cAMP) and cyclic guanosine monophosphate (cGMP). These enzymes belong to at least nine related gene fam ...

Glucose is the main substrate for most tissues of the body, and provides energy for cellular respiration and metabolic activities. The fate of glucose end-products depends, in part, on the physiological demands of the tissue in question. Similarly, the type and function of glucose transport ...

Determination of the flux of substances (ions or metabolites) into or out of cells is a recurrent issue in cell biology. This demands the incubation of cells in a medium followed by separation of the cells from this medium. To perform this type of experiment in brown, and especially in white, adipocytes, is ...

Adipose tissue (AT) function is regulated by both short-term and long-term mechanisms. Long-term adaptations to hormonal, nutritional, and developmental factors take place over a time course of hours to days. For example, chronic alterations in the hormonal milieu (analogous to those t ...

The possibility of maintaining viable cells in an incubator for prolonged periods, and studying dynamic changes in them in an environment that can be manipulated at will, is an attractive experimental approach. For studies of brown adipose tissue (BAT) recruitment, it provides a powerful a ...

Adipose tissues (ATs) were long considered as negligible and as simple filling tissues. The increase in knowledge concerning their role in energy balance and the increased occurrence of metabolic disorders, such as obesity and syndrome X, have focused the attention of the scientific comm ...

Preadipocyte cellular models have proven to be useful tools for the study of adipose cell development in vitro (1–5). Among these models are preadipocyte clonal lines from various origins and primary cultures of fibroblast-like adipose precursor cells present in the stromal-vascular ...

Recently, there has been rapidly growing interest in cell culture models that allow the study of the adipose differentiation process in vitro, as well as the long-term regulation of fat cell metabolism in human adipose tissue (AT) material. Although valuable clonal preadipocyte cell lines ...

In addition to their metabolic function of storing triglycerides and releasing free fatty acids upon hormonal stimulation, adipocytes are now recognized as behaving as secretory cells. During the past 10 yr, an increasing number of peptidic and nonpeptidic compounds have been demons ...

Adipose tissue (AT) is more than a collection of adipocytes. It is a highly organized tissue in which different cell types interact, and in which a complex mix of hormones and substrates arriving in the plasma, together with neural input and the rate of blood flow (BF), all regulate metabolic activity. T ...

Adipose tissue (AT) is a well-vascularized tissue with a capillary density corresponding to that of skeletal muscle. The blood supply to the tissue is tightly coordinated with the tissue metabolism. AT blood flow (BF) is increased during exercise and starvation, i.e., in situations in which fat ...

The microdialysis method was introduced 25 yr ago to measure neurotransmitter concentrations in the brains of laboratory animals. For 10 yr, this technique has been adapted, in metabolic studies, to monitor the interstitial concentrations of small-mol-wt compounds present in the ext ...

Since the discovery of the circulating peptide hormone, leptin, the recognition of adipose tissue (AT) as an endocrine organ has added a new perspective to obesity research. Numerous studies have shown the involvement of leptin (expressed predominantly in AT, placenta, and stomach) in the p ...

Light microscopy (LM) allows study of the anatomy of the adipose organ. For instance, it permits investigation of its microscopic organization (possible lobular subdivision) and the arrangement in the tissue of vessels, nerves, and main cell types (1). The unilocular or multilocular orga ...

The isolated rat adipose cell experimental system is the principal model for studies of the mechanism of insulin’s stimulatory action on glucose transport (reviewed in refs. 1–4). Despite the successful use of this preparation in biochemical studies, the unique structure of the adipose ce ...

For more than 30 yr, adipocytes have been an almost ideal model for the study of insulin action, because they can be prepared easily as a homogenous population of cells, they exhibit a marked hormonal response, and they can be fractionated into relatively pure membrane preparations. This subcell ...