Glucocorticoids play an important role in adipogenesis through the glucocorticoid receptor (GR) that forms a heterocomplex with Hsp90•Hsp70 and one high molecular weight immunophilin, either FKBP51 or FKBP52. When 3T3-L1 preadipocytes are induced to differentiate, FKBP51 expression progressively increases, whereas FKBP52 decreases, and Hsp90, Hsp70, p23 and Cyp40 remain unchanged. Interestingly, FKBP51 rapidly translocates from mitochondria to the nucleus where it is retained upon its interaction with chromatin and the nuclear matrix. FKBP51 nuclear localization is transient, and after 48 hours it cycles back to mitochondria. Importantly, this dynamic FKBP51 mitochondrial-nuclear shuttling depends on PKA signaling, because its inhibition by PKI or knockdown of PKA-cα by siRNA, prevented FKBP51 nuclear translocation induced by IBMX. In addition, the electrophoretic pattern of migration of FKBP51 is altered by treatment of cells with PKI or knockdown of PKA-cα, suggesting that FKBP51 is a PKA substrate. In preadipocytes, FKBP51 colocalizes with PKA-cα in mitochondria. When adipogenesis is triggered, PKA-cα also moves to the nucleus colocalizing with FKBP51 mainly in the nuclear lamina. Moreover, FKBP51 and GR interaction increases when preadipocytes are induced to differentiate. GR transcriptional capacity is reduced when cells are incubated in the presence of IBMX, forskolin or dibutyryl-cAMP, compounds that induced FKBP51 nuclear translocation, but not by a specific activator of EPAC. FKBP51 knockdown facilitates adipogenesis, whereas ectopic expression of FKBP51 blocks adipogenesis. These findings indicate that the dynamic mitochondrial-nuclear shuttling of FKBP51 regulated by PKA may be key in fine-tuning the transcriptional control of GR target genes required for the acquisition of adipocyte phenotype.

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J. Neurochem. (2012) 122, 4–18. Abstract Immunophilin is the collective name given to a family of proteins that bind immunosuppressive drugs: Some immunophilins are Hsp90‐binding cochaperones that affect steroid receptor function. Mood and anxiety disorders are stress‐related diseases characterized by an impaired function of the mineralocorticoid and glucocorticoid receptors, two of the major regulatory elements of the hypothalamus‐pituitary‐adrenocortical axis. Genetic variations of the FK506‐binding protein of 51‐kDa, FKBP51, one of the immunophilins bound to those steroid receptor complexes, were associated with the effectiveness of treatments against depression and with a major risk‐factor for the development of post‐traumatic stress disorders. Interestingly, immunophilins show polymorphisms and some polymorphic isoforms of FKBP51 correlate with a greater impairment of steroid receptor functions. In this review, we discuss different aspects of the role of FKBP51 in such steroid receptor function and the impact of genetic variants of the immunophilin on the dysregulation of the stress response.

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Adipocytes are the main stromal cells in the mammary microenvironment, and crosstalk between adipocytes and breast cancer cells may play a critical and important role in cancer maintenance and progression. Tumor-induced differentiation to beige/brown adipose tissue is an important contribution to the hypermetabolic state of breast cancer. However, the effect of epithelial cell-beige adipocyte communication on tumor progression remains unclear. To contribute to the understanding of this phenomenon, we characterized components present in conditioned media (CM) from beige adipocytes (BAs) or white adipocytes (WAs), and evaluated the effects of BA-and WA-CM on both adhesion and migration of tumor (LM3, 4T1 and MC4-L1) and non-tumor (NMuMG) mouse mammary epithelial cell lines. Additionally, we analyzed the expression of ObR, CD44, vimentin, MMP-9, MCT1 and LDH in tumor and non-tumor mouse mammary epithelial cell lines incubated with BA-CM, WA-CM or Ctrol-CM (control conditioned media). 3T3-L1 preadipocytes differentiated into beige adipocytes upon PPARγ activation (rosiglitazone) displaying characteristics that morphologically resembled brown/beige adipocytes. Levels of UCP1, CIDEA, GLUT4, leptin, MCT4 and FABP4 were increased, while adiponectin, caveolin 1 and perilipin 1 levels were decreased in BAs with respect to WAs. Tumor cell lines revealed lower cell adhesion and increased cell migration after incubation with BA-and WA-CM vs. Ctrol-CM. ObR and MMP-9 in MC4-L1 cells were significantly increased after incubation with BA-CM vs. WA-and Ctrol-CM. In addition, MC4-L1 and LM3 cells significantly increased their migration in the presence of BAs, suggesting that new signals originating from the crosstalk between BAs and tumor cells, could be responsible for this change. Our results indicate that beige adipocytes are able to regulate the behavior of both tumor and non-tumor mouse mammary epithelial cells, favoring tumor progression.

The prevalence of antibiotic resistance has resulted in the need for new approaches to be developed to combat previously easily treatable infections. The main aim of this work was to establish the potential of the synthetic α-diimine chromium(III) and ruthenium(II) complexes (where the α-diimine ligands are bpy = 2,2-bipyridine, phen = 1,10-phenanthroline, and dppz = dipyrido[3,2-a:2′,3′-c]-phenazine) like [Cr(phen)3]3+, [Cr(phen)2(dppz)]3+, [Ru(phen)3]2+, and [Ru(bpy)3]2+ as antibacterial agents by generating oxidative stress. The [Cr(phen)3]3+ and [Cr(phen)2(dppz)]3+ complexes showed activity against Gram positive and Gram negative bacteria with minimum inhibitory concentrations (MICs) ranging from 0.125 μg/mL to 1 μg/mL, while [Ru(phen)3]2+ and [Ru(bpy)3]2+ do not exhibit antimicrobial activity against the two bacterial genera studied at the concentration range used. When ciprofloxacin was combined with [Cr(phen)3]3+ for the inhibition of Staphylococcus aureus and Escherichia coli, an important synergistic effect was observed, FIC 0.066 for S. aureus and FIC 0.064 for E. coli. The work described here shows that chromium(III) complexes are bactericidal for S. aureus and E. coli. Our results indicate that α-diimine chromium(III) complexes may be interesting to open new paths for metallodrug chemotherapy against different bacterial genera since some of these complexes have been found to exhibit remarkable antibacterial activities.