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ARS Home » Northeast Area » Beltsville, Maryland (BARC) » Beltsville Agricultural Research Center » Animal Parasitic Diseases Laboratory » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #354310
Research Project: Molecular Approaches to Control Intestinal Parasites that Affect the Microbiome in Swine and Small Ruminants

Location: Animal Parasitic Diseases Laboratory

Title: Transcriptomic analysis reveals effects of fucoxanthin on intestinal glucose transport

Author
item CAO, WANXIU - Ocean University Of China
item LI, JING - Ocean University Of China
item CHIN, YAOXIAN - Ocean University Of China
item XUE, CHANG-HU - Ocean University Of China
item Li, Robert
item TANG, QING-JUAN - Ocean University Of China

Submitted to: Journal of Functional Foods
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 8/8/2018
Publication Date: 8/8/2018
Citation: Cao, W., Li, J., Chin, Y., Xue, C., Li, R.W., Tang, Q. 2018. Transcriptomic analysis reveals effects of fucoxanthin on intestinal glucose transport. Journal of Functional Foods. 49:205-213. 10.1016/j.jff.2018.08.018.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jff.2018.08.018

Interpretive Summary: Fucoxanthin is an abundant carotenoid derived from plants and algae. As a natural antioxidant, fucoxanthin is known to possess anti-inflammatory activities by suppressing production of nitric oxide, an important inflammatory molecule. Fucoxanthin has been promoted as a bioactive anti-inflammatory mediator. In this study, we investigated the molecular mechanism by which fucoxanthin modulates blood glucose levels using RNA-seq-based transcriptome analysis. Our results suggest that the hypoglycemic property of fucoxanthin is partially due to its regulatory effect on intestinal glucose transport. Moreover, our data set generated from the present study has contributed significantly to refining the RNAseq data analysis pipeline jointly developed by ARS scientists and scientists from J. Craig Venter Institute for agricultural animal species. Our findings should help exploit the full spectrum of health-promoting benefits of fucoxanthin.

Technical Abstract: Fucoxanthin, one of carotenoid pigments from plants and algae, is known to regulate blood glucose and insulin levels. The mechanism of its hypoglycemic activity has drawn a lot of scientific interest in recent years. In this study, we investigated the effects of fucoxanthin on intestinal glucose transport using a murine model. Our data demonstrated that fucoxanthin was able to decrease blood glucose level and alleviate insulin resistance significantly. The results from RNA-seq based transcriptomic analysis suggests that fucoxanthin acted as key regulators in Insulin/PI3K/AKT/mTOR signaling and PKA/AMPK/mTOR signaling pathways. Moreover, fucoxanthin ingestion resulted in a significant reduction in the protein expression of intestinal glucose transporters, such as SGLT-1, and led to the translocation of GLUT-2, which contributed to the regulation of blood glucose level. Together, our findings provided a mechanistic insight into the regulatory effect of fucoxanthin on blood glucose.