@article{GohlkeManciniGarciaCarrizoetal.2021,
  author    = {Gohlke, Sabrina and Mancini, Carola and Garcia-Carrizo, Francisco and Schulz, Tim J.},
  title     = {Loss of the ciliary gene Bbs4 results in defective thermogenesis due to metabolic inefficiency and impaired lipid metabolism},
  series = {The FASEB journal : the official journal of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology},
  volume    = {35},
  journal   = {The FASEB journal : the official journal of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology},
  number    = {11},
  publisher = {Wiley},
  address   = {Hoboken},
  issn      = {1530-6860},
  doi       = {10.1096/fj.202100772RR},
  pages     = {13},
  year      = {2021},
  abstract  = {Adipose tissue is central to the regulation of energy balance. While white adipose tissue (WAT) is responsible for triglyceride storage, brown adipose tissue specializes in energy expenditure. Deterioration of brown adipocyte function contributes to the development of metabolic complications like obesity and diabetes. These disorders are also leading symptoms of the Bardet-Biedl syndrome (BBS), a hereditary disorder in humans which is caused by dysfunctions of the primary cilium and which therefore belongs to the group of ciliopathies. The cilium is a hair-like organelle involved in cellular signal transduction. The BBSome, a supercomplex of several Bbs gene products, localizes to the basal body of cilia and is thought to be involved in protein sorting to and from the ciliary membrane. The effects of a functional BBSome on energy metabolism and lipid mobilization in brown and white adipocytes were tested in whole-body Bbs4 knockout mice that were subjected to metabolic challenges. Chronic cold exposure reveals cold-intolerance of knockout mice but also ameliorates the markers of metabolic pathology detected in knockouts prior to cold. Hepatic triglyceride content is markedly reduced in knockout mice while circulating lipids are elevated, altogether suggesting that defective lipid metabolism in adipose tissue creates increased demand for systemic lipid mobilization to meet energetic demands of reduced body temperatures. These findings taken together suggest that Bbs4 is essential for the regulation of adipose tissue lipid metabolism, representing a potential target to treat metabolic disorders.},
  language  = {en}
}
@article{GohlkeZagoriyInostrozaetal.2019,
  author    = {Gohlke, Sabrina and Zagoriy, Vyacheslav and Inostroza, Alvaro Cuadros and Meret, Michael and Mancini, Carola and Japtok, Lukasz and Schumacher, Fabian and Kuhlow, Doreen and Graja, Antonia and Stephanowitz, Heike and J{\"a}hnert, Markus and Krause, Eberhard and Wernitz, Andreas and Petzke, Klaus-Juergen and Sch{\"u}rmann, Annette and Kleuser, Burkhard and Schulz, Tim Julius},
  title     = {Identification of functional lipid metabolism biomarkers of brown adipose tissue aging},
  series = {Molecular Metabolism},
  volume    = {24},
  journal   = {Molecular Metabolism},
  publisher = {Elsevier},
  address   = {Amsterdam},
  issn      = {2212-8778},
  doi       = {10.1016/j.molmet.2019.03.011},
  pages     = {1 -- 17},
  year      = {2019},
  abstract  = {Objective: Aging is accompanied by loss of brown adipocytes and a decline in their thermogenic potential, which may exacerbate the development of adiposity and other metabolic disorders. Presently, only limited evidence exists describing the molecular alterations leading to impaired brown adipogenesis with aging and the contribution of these processes to changes of systemic energy metabolism. Methods: Samples of young and aged murine brown and white adipose tissue were used to compare age-related changes of brown adipogenic gene expression and thermogenesis-related lipid mobilization. To identify potential markers of brown adipose tissue aging, non-targeted proteomic and metabolomic as well as targeted lipid analyses were conducted on young and aged tissue samples. Subsequently, the effects of several candidate lipid classes on brown adipocyte function were examined. Results: Corroborating previous reports of reduced expression of uncoupling protein-1, we observe impaired signaling required for lipid mobilization in aged brown fat after adrenergic stimulation. Omics analyses additionally confirm the age-related impairment of lipid homeostasis and reveal the accumulation of specific lipid classes, including certain sphingolipids, ceramides, and dolichols in aged brown fat. While ceramides as well as enzymes of dolichol metabolism inhibit brown adipogenesis, inhibition of sphingosine 1-phosphate receptor 2 induces brown adipocyte differentiation. Conclusions: Our functional analyses show that changes in specific lipid species, as observed during aging, may contribute to reduced thermogenic potential. They thus uncover potential biomarkers of aging as well as molecular mechanisms that could contribute to the degradation of brown adipocytes, thereby providing potential treatment strategies of age-related metabolic conditions.},
  language  = {en}
}
@phdthesis{Mancini2021,
  author    = {Mancini, Carola},
  title     = {Analysis of the effects of age-related changes of metabolic flux on brown adipocyte formation and function},
  doi       = {10.25932/publishup-51266},
  school      = {Universit{\"a}t Potsdam},
  pages     = {xvii, 134},
  year      = {2021},
  abstract  = {Brown adipose tissue (BAT) is responsible for non-shivering thermogenesis, thereby allowing mammals to maintain a constant body temperature in a cold environment. Thermogenic capacity of this tissue is due to a high mitochondrial density and expression of uncoupling protein 1 (UCP1), a unique brown adipocyte marker which dissipates the mitochondrial proton gradient to produce heat instead of ATP. BAT is actively involved in whole-body metabolic homeostasis and during aging there is a loss of classical brown adipose tissue with concomitantly reduced browning capacity of white adipose tissue. Therefore, an age-dependent decrease of BAT-related energy expenditure capacity may exacerbate the development of metabolic diseases, including obesity and type 2 diabetes mellitus. Given that direct effects of age-related changes of BAT-metabolic flux have yet to be unraveled, the aim of the current thesis is to investigate potential metabolic mechanisms involved in BAT-dysfunction during aging and to identify suitable metabolic candidates as functional biomarkers of BAT-aging. To this aim, integration of transcriptomic, metabolomic and proteomic data analyses of BAT from young and aged mice was performed, and a group of candidates with age-related changes was revealed. Metabolomic analysis showed age-dependent alterations of metabolic intermediates involved in energy, nucleotide and vitamin metabolism, with major alterations regarding the purine nucleotide pool. These data suggest a potential role of nucleotide intermediates in age-related BAT defects. In addition, the screening of transcriptomic and proteomic data sets from BAT of young and aged mice allowed identification of a 60-kDa lysophospholipase, also known as L-asparaginase (Aspg), whose expression declines during BAT-aging. Involvement of Aspg in brown adipocyte thermogenic function was subsequently analyzed at the molecular level using in vitro approaches and animal models. The findings revealed sensitivity of Aspg expression to β3-adrenergic activation via different metabolic cues, including cold exposure and treatment with β3-adrenergic agonist CL. To further examine ASPG function in BAT, an over-expression model of Aspg in a brown adipocyte cell line was established and showed that these cells were metabolically more active compared to controls, revealing increased expression of the main brown-adipocyte specific marker UCP1, as well as higher lipolysis rates. An in vitro loss-of-function model of Aspg was also functionally analyzed, revealing reduced brown adipogenic characteristics and an impaired lipolysis, thus confirming physiological relevance of Aspg in brown adipocyte function. Characterization of a transgenic mouse model with whole-body inactivation of the Aspg gene (Aspg-KO) allowed investigation of the role of ASPG under in vivo conditions, indicating a mild obesogenic phenotype, hypertrophic white adipocytes, impairment of the early thermogenic response upon cold-stimulation and dysfunctional insulin sensitivity. Taken together, these data show that ASPG may represent a new functional biomarker of BAT-aging that regulates thermogenesis and therefore a potential target for the treatment of age-related metabolic disease.},
  language  = {en}
}