Glucose regulates leucine-induced insulin release and the expression of the branched chain ketoacid dehydrogenase E1 alpha subunit gene in pancreatic islets.

Much evidence has accumulated to support the idea that leucine can stimulate insulin release by allosterically activating glutamate dehydrogenase thus enhancing glutamate metabolism. It is less clear how the metabolism of leucine itself contributes to the signal for insulin release. We recently found that culturing pancreatic islets for 1 day at low glucose (1 mM) suppressed glucose-induced insulin release, but preserved leucine-induced insulin release. When islets were cultured at high glucose (20 mM), glucose-induced insulin release was preserved, but leucine-induced insulin release was suppressed (MacDonald, M. J., Fahien, L. A., McKenzie, D. I., and Moran, S. M. (1990) Am. J. Physiol., 259, E548-E554). The suppression of leucine-induced insulin release can be explained by glucose's suppression of the synthesis of the enzyme that catalyzes the first committed step of leucine metabolism, branched chain ketoacid dehydrogenase complex (BCKDH). High glucose suppressed the enzyme activity of the E1 component of the BCKDH complex, as well as the total activity of the BCKDH complex, to usually negligible levels in islets and decreased by an average of 90% the mRNA which encodes E1 alpha, the catalytic subunit of the E1 component of BCKDH, in islets and rat insulinoma cells. Time course studies showed that about 24 h in culture was required to maximally induce or suppress the expression of BCKDH E1 alpha. Culture at high glutamine with or without leucine mimicked to a lesser and more variable degree the effects of high glucose on leucine-induced insulin release and BCKDH E1 alpha mRNA. Leucine-plus-glutamine-induced insulin release was present after culture of islets with glucose and with or without any other secretagogue. Also, glutamate dehydrogenase transcripts and enzyme activity were not significantly altered by varying the concentration of glucose in the culture medium. Thus, leucine's insulinotropism via activation of glutamate dehydrogenase is constitutive. Preproinsulin mRNA levels were markedly increased at high glucose and glyceraldehyde phosphate dehydrogenase transcripts were either unaffected or slightly increased by glucose. Glutamine did not significantly effect the expression of genes other than BCKDH E1 alpha, and leucine had little or no effect on the expression of any of the four genes.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 400 WORDS)