Repeated 2-deoxy-D-glucose-induced glucoprivation attenuates Fos expression and glucoregulatory responses during subsequent glucoprivation.

A condition of reduced responsiveness to hypoglycemia, known as hypoglycemia-associated autonomic failure (HAAF), occurs in diabetic patients in the wake of a prior hypoglycemic episode. This condition suggests that hypoglycemia alters central glucose-sensing mechanisms. This experiment examined the effects of repeated 2-deoxy-D-glucose (2DG)-induced glucoprivation on subsequent 2DG-induced feeding and hyperglycemic responses in rats. Fos immunoreactivity (ir) in adrenal medulla and brain sites involved in these responses was also examined. Rats were injected daily for 10 days with 2DG (200 mg/kg) or saline (0.9%) or were handled. On day 11, rats were injected with 2DG (200 mg/kg). After injection, food intake was measured in one group. In another group, food was withheld, and multiple blood samples were collected for glucose determination. In a third group, food was withheld, and rats were killed after 2 h for evaluation of Fos-ir. Prior repeated glucoprivation reduced subsequent feeding and hyperglycemia responses to 2DG to baseline levels. Double-label immunohistochemistry showed that Fos-ir was reduced or abolished in catecholamine cell groups A1, A1/C1, C1, C3, and A6 and in the paraventricular nucleus of the hypothalamus and adrenal medulla. In other brain sites, 2DG-induced Fos-ir was diminished or unaffected by prior glucoprivation. Sites in which Fos-ir was abolished have been implicated previously in glucoprivic control of feeding and adrenal medullary secretion. Therefore, the present findings may identify crucial neuroanatomical sites that are altered by prior glucoprivation and that mediate some of the physiological deficits observed in HAAF.