Exploration of macromolecular phenotype of human skeletal muscle in diabetes using infrared spectroscopy

Zupančič, Barbara (author), Ugwoke, Chiedozie Kenneth (author), Abdelmonaem, Mohamed Elwy Abdelhamed (author), Alibegović, Armin (author), Cvetko, Erika (author), Grdadolnik, Jože (author), Šerbec, Anja (author), Umek, Nejc (author)

Introduction: The global burden of diabetes mellitus is escalating, and more efficient investigative strategies are needed for a deeper understanding of underlying pathophysiological mechanisms. The crucial role of skeletal muscle in carbohydrate and lipid metabolism makes it one of the most susceptible tissues to diabetes-related metabolic disorders. In tissue studies, conventional histochemical methods have several technical limitations and have been shown to inadequately characterise the biomolecular phenotype of skeletal muscle to provide a holistic view of the pathologically altered proportions of macromolecular constituents. Materials and methods: In this pilot study, we examined the composition of five different human skeletal muscles from male donors diagnosed with type 2 diabetes and non-diabetic controls. We analysed the lipid, glycogen, and collagen content in the muscles in a traditional manner with histochemical assays using different staining techniques. This served as a reference for comparison with the unconventional analysis of tissue composition using Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy as an alternative methodological approach. Results: A thorough chemometric post-processing of the infrared spectra using a multi-stage spectral decomposition allowed the simultaneous identification of various compositional details from a vibrational spectrum measured in a single experiment. We obtained multifaceted information about the proportions of the different macromolecular constituents of skeletal muscle, which even allowed us to distinguish protein constituents with different structural properties. The most important methodological steps for a comprehensive insight into muscle composition have thus been set and parameters identified that can be used for the comparison between healthy and diabetic muscles. Conclusion: We have established a methodological framework based on vibrational spectroscopy for the detailed macromolecular analysis of human skeletal muscle that can effectively complement or may even serve as an alternative to histochemical assays. As this is a pilot study with relatively small sample sets, we remain cautious at this stage in drawing definitive conclusions about diabetes-related changes in skeletal muscle composition. However, the main focus and contribution of our work has been to provide an alternative, simple and efficient approach for this purpose. We are confident that we have achieved this goal and have brought our methodology to a level from which it can be successfully transferred to a large-scale study that allows the effects of diabetes on skeletal muscle composition and the interrelationships between the macromolecular tissue alterations due to diabetes to be investigated.

• Language: English
• Keywords: diabetes mellitus, skeletal muscle, metabolism, macromulecular composition, infrared spectroscopy, multivariate analysis, histochemical assays
• Work type: Article
• Typology: 1.01 - Original Scientific Article
• Organization: MF - Faculty of Medicine; BF - Biotechnical Faculty
• Publication status: Published
• Publication version: Version of Record
• Year: 2023
• Number of pages: 17 str.
• Numbering: Vol. 14, art. 1308373
• PID: 20.500.12556/RUL-164815
• UDC: 616.4
• ISSN on article: 1664-2392
• DOI: 10.3389/fendo.2023.1308373
• COBISS.SI-ID: 178901251
• Publication date in RUL: 13.11.2024

Record is a part of a journal

• Title: Frontiers in endocrinology
• Publisher: Frontiers Media
• ISSN: 1664-2392
• COBISS.SI-ID: 3340154

Licences

• License: CC BY 4.0, Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
• Link: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
• Description: This is the standard Creative Commons license that gives others maximum freedom to do what they want with the work as long as they credit the author.

Secondary language

• Language: Slovenian
• Keywords: sladkorna bolezen, skeletne mišice, metabolizem, makromolekulska sestava, infrardeča spektroskopija, multivariatna analiza, histokemični testi