Muscle Hypertrophy Induced by Myostatin Inhibition Accelerates Degeneration in Dysferlinopathy. Mus musculus

Because myostatin normally limits skeletal muscle growth, there is an extensive effort to develop myostatin inhibitors for clinical use. One potential concern is that in patients with muscle degenerative diseases, inducing hypertrophy may increase stress on dystrophic fibers. Here, we show that blocking the myostatin pathway in dysferlin mutant mice results in early improvement in histopathology but ultimately accelerates muscle degeneration. Hence, benefits of this approach should be weighed against these potential detrimental effects. Overall design: Affymetrix Mouse Exon 1.0 ST arrays were hybridized in three biologically independent experiments with RNA from quadriceps muscles of wt, Dysf-/-, F66, F66;Dysf-/- mice, and ACVR2B/Fc-injected wt and Dysf-/- mice at the age of 10 weeks (3 duplicates in 6 different groups, 18 samples).