Gene expression profiles in cardiac specific overexpression of Glut1 transgenic mice

Cardiac-specific Glut1 transgenic (Glut1-TG) mice exhibited higher glucose uptake and utilization compared with wild type mice. Cardiac pathological hypertrophy is accompanied by a switch of substrate metabolism from fatty acid oxidation to glucose use, resulting in a fetal like metabolic profile. However, the role of increasing glucose utilization in regulating cardiomyocyte growth is poorly understood. In order to identify novel pathways that is regulated by glucose, we performed microarray analyses using hearts from Glut1-TG and WT mice. The microarray analyses revealed that many genes that are involved in branched-chain amino acids (BCAAs) were downregulated in Glut1-TG mice. Two groups of cardiac-specific transgenic mice were used for this study, control and Glut1-TG mice. Hearts were dissected from 11-12 weeks old male mice (FVB background). Total RNA was prepared from the hearts to conduct the microarray analyses.