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O-GlcNAc modification is essential for the regulation of autophagy in Drosophila melanogaster

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Abstract

O-GlcNAcylation is a dynamic post-translational modification that takes place on ser/thr residues of nucleocytoplasmic proteins. O-GlcNAcylation regulates almost all cellular events as a nutrient sensor, a transcriptional and translational regulator, and a disease-related factor. Although the role of O-GlcNAcylation in insulin signaling and metabolism are well established, the relationship between O-GlcNAcylation and autophagy is largely unknown. Here, we manipulated O-GlcNAcylation in Drosophila and found that it regulates autophagy through Akt/dFOXO signaling. We demonstrate that O-GlcNAcylation and the levels of O-GlcNAc transferase (OGT) are increased during starvation. Furthermore, Atg proteins and autolysosomes are increased in OGT-reduced flies without fasting. Atg proteins and autophagosomes are reduced in OGT-overexpressing flies. Our results suggest that not only autophagy gene expression but also autophagic structures are regulated by OGT through Akt and dFOXO. These data imply that O-GlcNAcylation is important in modulating autophagy as well as insulin signaling in Drosophila.

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Acknowledgments

We thank K. M. Choe, and K. Yu for fly stocks and DNA clones, and O. Puig and K. Yu for providing the anti dFOXO antibody. We are also grateful to other members of the Cho and Choe laboratories for helpful discussions. This work is partly supported by the Graduate School of Yonsei University. This work was supported by Basic Science Research Program through the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) funded by the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology (NRF-2013R1A2A1A01008067) to J. W. C.

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The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest to declare.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Integrated OMICS for Biomedical Science, Graduate School, Yonsei University, 50 Yonsei-ro, Seodaemun-gu, Seoul, 120-749, South Korea

    Sujin Park, Yangsin Lee, Jin Won Pak, Hanbyeol Kim, Jürgen Roth & Jin Won Cho

  2. Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Integrated Genomic Research Center for Metabolic Regulation, Institute of Genetic Science, Yonsei University College of Medicine, Seoul, Korea

    Hyeonjin Choi & Jae-woo Kim

  3. Brain Korea 21 PLUS Project for Medical Science, Yonsei University, Seoul, Korea

    Hyeonjin Choi & Jae-woo Kim

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  1. Sujin Park
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  2. Yangsin Lee
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Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Jürgen Roth or Jin Won Cho.

Additional information

J. Roth and J. W. Cho are co-corresponding authors.

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18_2015_1889_MOESM1_ESM.tif

Supplementary material 1 Figure S1. The effects of increased OGT or OGT knockdown on overall O-GlcNAc levels. (A) Larval lysates from UAS-OGT and Act>OGT in feeding and fasting were analyzed by immunoblot with RL2 antibody. (B) Larvae lysates used for immunoblotting from UAS-OGTi and Act>OGTi in feeding and fasting to detect overall O-GlcNAc levels (TIFF 7877 kb)

18_2015_1889_MOESM2_ESM.tif

Supplementary material 2 Figure S2. The effect of O-GlcNAcylation on protein levels of Atg8a and the number of lysosomes. (A) S2 cells were transfected with pMT-FLAG-dogt for 48 h and harvested for immunoblotting. Anti-RL2, anti-FLAG, anti-β-actin, and anti-Atg8a antibodies are used. (B) Quantification of the amount of Atg8a in (A) (*p<0.05, student’s t-test). (C) A morphometric evaluation of EM images (***p<0.001, student’s t-test). TEM reveals many lysosomes in OGT-overexpressing larval fat bodies (TIFF 10380 kb)

18_2015_1889_MOESM3_ESM.tif

Supplementary material 3 Figure S3. O-GlcNAcylated proteins of the autophagy pathway. (A) S2 cells were treated with 10μM PP242 for 4 h to induce autophagy. Representative western blots showing β-actin and Atg8a in control and PP242-treated S2 cells. Lysates were prepared and analyzed either directly by immunoblotting (Input) or following pull-down with sWGA-agarose to detect O-GlcNAc modification on dFOXO. (B) WT mice were treated with the O-GlcNAcase inhibitor, thiamet-G (TG) for 7 days to increase total O-GlcNAcylation. Total O-GlcNAcylation of control and thiamet-G injected mouse brain. (C) To demonstrate O-GlcNAcylation on Atg7, Atg7 was immunoprecipitated using specific O-GlcNAc antibody followed by Western blotting with anti-Atg7 antibody. Brain lysates were prepared and analyzed either directly by immunoblotting or following pull-down with sWGA agarose to detect O-GlcNAcylation on Atg7, LC3, and Atg5. β-actin was used as a loading control. (D) Control and PP242-treated S2 cell lysates were prepared and analyzed either directly by immunoblotting as input or following pull-down with sWGA agarose to detect O-GlcNAcylation on dAtg5 and Atg8a. β-actin was used as a loading control. (E) Whole cell lysate of GFP-mCherry-Atg8a-expressing larvae with feeding or fasting. Larval lysates were prepared and analyzed either directly by immunoblotting (input) or following pull-down with sWGA agarose to detect O-GlcNAcylation on Atg8a using mCherry and GFP antibodies. Upper arrow is mCherry-GFP-Atg8a and lower arrow is free mCherry. β-actin was used as a loading control (TIFF 173286 kb)

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Park, S., Lee, Y., Pak, J.W. et al. O-GlcNAc modification is essential for the regulation of autophagy in Drosophila melanogaster . Cell. Mol. Life Sci. 72, 3173–3183 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00018-015-1889-z

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00018-015-1889-z

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