Endocrine Abstracts

The concept of adipose tissue plasticity is well known, as is the fact that a positive energy balance drives increased adiposity in vivo. Less well accepted or indeed understood, are the molecular mechanisms that negatively regulate adipose tissue plasticity particularly under physiological and/or patho-physiological conditions. The latter is clearly relevant when one considers the possibility that there may be a limit in the extent to which adipose tissue can expand. O...

To maintain a proper lipid composition of cellular membranes is fundamental for cell viability and intracellular signalling. Therefore we hypothesised the existence of membrane quality control homeostatic mechanisms. Previously, we have shown that Pyruvate Carboxylase (PC), an enzyme involved in de novo lipogenesis and fuel partitioning, is a target of PPARγ and that PC level is decreased in PPARγ KO and obese insulin resistant mouse models. Here, we used RNAi...