Liver glycogen in type 2 diabetic mice is randomly branched as enlarged aggregates with blunted glucose release.

Glycogen is a vital highly branched polymer of glucose that is essential for blood glucose homeostasis. In this article, the structure of liver glycogen from mice is investigated with respect to size distributions, degradation kinetics, and branching structure, complemented by a comparison of normal and diabetic liver glycogen. This is done to screen for differences that may result from disease. Glycogen α-particle (diameter ∼ 150 nm) and β-particle (diameter ∼ 25 nm) size distributions are reported, along with in vitro γ-amylase degradation experiments, and a small angle X-ray scattering analysis of mouse β-particles. Type 2 diabetic liver glycogen upon extraction was found to be present as large loosely bound, aggregates, not present in normal livers. Liver glycogen was found to aggregate in vitro over a period of 20 h, and particle size is shown to be related to rate of glucose release, allowing a structure-function relationship to be inferred for the tissue specific distribution of particle types. Application of branching theories to small angle X-ray scattering data for mouse β-particles revealed these particles to be randomly branched polymers, not fractal polymers. Together, this article shows that type 2 diabetic liver glycogen is present as large aggregates in mice, which may contribute to the inflexibility of interconversion between glucose and glycogen in type 2 diabetes, and further that glycogen particles are randomly branched with a size that is related to the rate of glucose release.