Glycaemia Regulates the Glucose Transporter Number in the Plasma Membrane of Rat Skeletal Muscle

The number of glucose transporters was measured in isolated membranes from diabetic-rat skeletal muscle to determine the role of circulating blood glucose levels in the control of glucose uptake into skeletal muscle. Three experimental groups of animals were investigated in the post-absorptive state: normoglycaemic/normoinsulinaemic, hyperglycaemic/normoinsulinaemic and hyperglycaemic/normoinsulinaemic made normoglycaemic/normoinsulinaemic by phlorizin treatment. Hyperglycaemia caused a reversible decrease in total transporter number, as measured by cytochalasin B binding, in both plasma membranes and internal membranes of skeletal muscle. Changes in GLUT4 glucose transporter protein mirrored changes in cytochalasin B binding in plasma membranes. However, there was no recovery of GLUT4 levels in intracellular membranes with correction of glycaemia. GLUT4 mRNA levels decreased with hyperglycaemia and recovered only partially with correction of glycaemia. Conversely, GLUT1 glucose transporters were only detectable in the plasma membranes; the levels of this protein varied directly with glycaemia, i.e. in the opposite direction to GLUT4 glucose transporters. This study demonstrates that hyperglycaemia, in the absence of hypoinsulinaemia, is capable of down-regulating the glucose transport system in skeletal muscle, the major site of peripheral resistance to insulin-stimulated glucose transport in diabetes. Furthermore, correction of hyperglycaemia causes a complete restoration of the transport system in the basal state (determined by the transporter number in the plasma membrane), but possibly only an incomplete recovery of the transport system's ability to respond to insulin (since there is no recovery of GLUT4 levels in the intracellular membrane insulin-responsive transporter pool). Finally, the effect of hyperglycaemia is specific for glucose transporter isoforms, with GLUT1 and GLUT4 proteins varying respectively in parallel and opposite directions to levels of glycaemia.