Cytokines dominate the secretome of primary human myotubes in an in vitro exercise model

Muscle contraction during exercise is the major stimulus for the release of peptides and proteins (myokines) that are supposed to take part in the benefical adaptation to exercise. We hypothesize that application of an in vitro exercise stimulus as electric pulse stimulation (EPS) to human myotubes enables the investigation of the human muscle secretome in a clearly defined model. We applied EPS for 24 h to primary human myotubes and studied the whole genome-wide transcriptional response and as well as the release of candidate myokines. We observed 183 differentially regulated transcripts with fold-changes > 1.3. The transcriptional response resembles several properties of the in vivo situation in the skeletal muscle after endurance exercise, namely significant enrichment of pathways associated with interleukin and chemokine signaling, lipid metabolism, and anti-oxidant defense; notably without increased release of creatin kinase.

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Scheler M, Irmler M, Lehr S, Hartwig S, Staiger H, Al-Hasani H, Beckers J, de Angelis MH, Häring HU, Weigert C