Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) is a devastating disease characterized by muscle wasting, loss of mobility and death in early adulthood. Satellite cells are muscle-resident stem cells responsible for the repair and regeneration of damaged muscles. One pathological feature of DMD is the progressive depletion of satellite cells, leading to the failure of muscle repair. Here, we attempted to explore the molecular mechanisms underlying satellite cell ablation in the dystrophin mutant mdx mouse, a well-established model for DMD. Initial muscle degeneration activates satellite cells, resulting in increased satellite cell number in young mdx mice. This is followed by rapid loss of satellite cells with age due to the reduced self-renewal ability of mdx satellite cells. In addition, satellite cell composition is altered even in young mdx mice, with significant reductions in the abundance of non-committed (Pax7+ and Myf5−) satellite cells. Using a Notch-reporter mouse, we found that the mdx satellite cells have reduced activation of Notch signaling, which has been shown to be necessary to maintain satellite cell quiescence and self-renewal. Concomitantly, the expression of Notch1, Notch3, Jag1, Hey1 and HeyL are reduced in the mdx primary myoblast. Finally, we established a mouse model to constitutively activate Notch signaling in satellite cells, and show that Notch activation is sufficient to rescue the self-renewal deficiencies of mdx satellite cells. These results demonstrate that Notch signaling is essential for maintaining the satellite cell pool and that its deficiency leads to depletion of satellite cells in DMD.

Matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) are a group of extracellular proteases involved in tissue remodeling in several physiological and pathophysiological conditions. While increased expression of MMPs (especially MMP-9) has been observed in skeletal muscle in numerous conditions, their physiological significance remains less-well understood. By generating novel skeletal muscle-specific transgenic (Tg) mice expressing constitutively active mutant of MMP-9 (i.e. MMP-9G100L), in this study, we have investigated the effects of elevated levels of MMP-9 on skeletal muscle structure and function in vivo. Tg expression of enzymatically active MMP-9 protein significantly increased skeletal muscle fiber cross-section area, levels of contractile proteins and force production in isometric contractions. MMP-9 stimulated the activation of the Akt signaling pathway in Tg mice. Moreover, expression of active MMP-9 increased the proportion of fast-type fiber in soleus muscle of mice. Overexpression of MMP-9 also considerably reduced the deposition of collagens I and IV in skeletal muscle in vivo. In one-year-old mdx mice (a model for Duchenne muscular dystrophy, DMD), deletion of the Mmp9 gene reduced fiber hypertrophy and phosphorylation of Akt and p38 mitogen-activated protein kinase. Collectively, our study suggests that elevated levels of active MMP-9 protein cause hypertrophy in skeletal muscle and that the modulation of MMP-9 levels may have therapeutic value in various muscular disorders including DMD.

Peroxisome proliferator-activated receptors (PPARs) are a class of nuclear receptors that play important roles in development and energy metabolism. Whereas PPARδ has been shown to regulate mitochondrial biosynthesis and slow-muscle fiber types, its function in skeletal muscle progenitors (satellite cells) is unknown. Since constitutive mutation of Pparδ leads to embryonic lethality, we sought to address this question by conditional knockout (cKO) of Pparδ using Myf5-Cre/Pparδflox/flox alleles to ablate PPARδ in myogenic progenitor cells. Although Pparδ-cKO mice were born normally and initially displayed no difference in body weight, muscle size or muscle composition, they later developed metabolic syndrome, which manifested as increased body weight and reduced response to glucose challenge at age nine months. Pparδ-cKO mice had 40% fewer satellite cells than their wild-type littermates, and these satellite cells exhibited reduced growth kinetics and proliferation in vitro. Furthermore, regeneration of Pparδ-cKO muscles was impaired after cardiotoxin-induced injury. Gene expression analysis showed reduced expression of the Forkhead box class O transcription factor 1 (FoxO1) gene in Pparδ-cKO muscles under both quiescent and regenerating conditions, suggesting that PPARδ acts through FoxO1 in regulating muscle progenitor cells. These results support a function of PPARδ in regulating skeletal muscle metabolism and insulin sensitivity, and they establish a novel role of PPARδ in muscle progenitor cells and postnatal muscle regeneration.

The double-headed arrowhead protease inhibitors API-A and -B from the tubers of Sagittaria sagittifolia (Linn) feature two distinct reactive sites, unlike other members of their family. Although the two inhibitors have been extensively characterized, the identities of the two P1 residues in both API-A and -B remain controversial. The crystal structure of a ternary complex at 2.48 Å resolution revealed that the two trypsins bind on opposite sides of API-A and are 34 Å apart. The overall fold of API-A belongs to the ␤-trefoil fold and resembles that of the soybean Kunitz-type trypsin inhibitors. The two P1 residues were unambiguously assigned as Leu 87 and Lys 145 , and their identities were further confirmed by site-directed mutagenesis. Reactive site 1, composed of residues P5 Met 83 to P5 Ala 92 , adopts a novel conformation with the Leu 87 completely embedded in the S1 pocket even though it is an unfavorable P1 residue for trypsin. Reactive site 2, consisting of residues P5 Cys 141 to P5 Glu 150 , binds trypsin in the classic mode by employing a two-disulfide-bonded loop. Analysis of the two binding interfaces sheds light on atomic details of the inhibitor specificity and also promises potential improvements in enzyme activity by engineering of the reactive sites.Protease inhibitors (PIs) 4 are ubiquitously distributed in all organisms, including plants, animals, and microorganisms (1). They play vital roles in regulating their corresponding proteases, which are involved in many biological processes such as protein digestion, cell signal transmission, inflammation, apoptosis, blood coagulation, and embryogenesis (2). The clinical applications of PIs are widespread, and there is great interest in developing more potent therapeutic PIs for treating human diseases related to cancer (3), pancreatitis (4), thrombosis (5), and AIDS (6). To this end, the soybean Kunitz-type serine proteases inhibitors have been extensively studied (1,(7)(8)(9)(10)(11). The inhibitors of this family generally contain 170 -200 residues and have two disulfide bonds. Most members have only one reactive site located in the region of residues 60 -70 (7,10,(12)(13)(14). However, a few members possess two reactive sites that simultaneously bind two protease molecules and are thus termed double-headed inhibitors (15-18). All of these inhibitors are classified into family I3 of peptidase inhibitors (19). Most members are further grouped into subfamily I3A. However, the double-headed arrowhead PIs API-A and -B are grouped in subfamily I3B because of their very low sequence similarity to other members (19). In contrast to other double-headed PIs such as the Bowman-Birk and ovomucoid inhibitors, which have two identical reactive sites that have evolved by domain shuffling and gene duplication (1, 20 -25), both API-A and -B have two distinct reactive sites.API-A and -B were first purified from the tubers of Sagittaria sagittifolia (Linn) in 1979 (26). Both consist of 179 residues with three disulfide bonds and can inhibit a variety of serine pr...

Regeneration of skeletal muscles is limited in cases of volumetric muscle loss and muscle degenerative diseases. Therefore, there is a critical need for developing strategies that provide cellular and structural support for skeletal muscle regeneration. In the present work, a bioengineered cell niche composed of mechanically competent aligned polyester fiber scaffolds is developed to mimic the oriented muscle fiber microenvironment by electrospinning poly(lactide-co-glycolide) (PLGA) using a custom-designed rotating collector with interspaced parallel blades. Aligned fiber scaffolds with fiber diameters ranging from 335 ± 154 nm to 3013 ± 531 nm are characterized for their bioactivities in supporting growth and differentiation of myoblasts. During in vitro culture, polymeric scaffolds with larger fiber diameter support enhanced alignment, growth, and differentiation of myoblasts associated with phosphorylation of p38 MAPK and upregulated expression of myogenin and myosin heavy chain. In vivo studies using a dystrophin-deficient mdx mouse model show that optimized fiber scaffolds seeded with primary myoblasts result in formation of dystrophin-positive myofibers network in tibialis anterior muscles. Collectively, these experiments provide critical insights on harnessing interactions between muscle cells and engineered fiber matrices to develop effective biomaterials for accelerated muscle regeneration.