Analysis of gene expression signatures in brown adipose tissue (BAT) following acute activation of AgRP neurons. Mus musculus

We have found that acute activation of AgRP-neurons lead to inhibition of insulin-stimulated glucose uptake into BAT. Based on this finding, we asked whether this effect was accompanied by acute changes in gene expression, which could point to the mechanism(s) underlying the impaired insulin sensitivity. In summary, our data suggest that activation of AgRP-neurons actuely reprograms gene expression in BAT towards a myogenic profile. Overall design: The arcuate nucleus of 4 mice expressing channelrhodopsin 2 in AgRP-neurons through Cre-mediated recombination (ChR2-AgRP) and 4 Cre-negative controls (ChR2-fl/WT, Ctrl), were stimulated with blue laser light for one hour, total RNA from BAT was isolated and subjected to a microarray-based gene expression analysis.