Beige adipocytes possess a discrete developmental origin and notable plasticity in thermogenic capacity in response to various environmental cues. But the transcriptional machinery controlling beige adipocyte development and thermogenesis remains largely unknown. By analyzing beige adipocyte-specific knockout mice, we identified a transcription factor, Forkhead Box P4 (FOXP4) that differentially governs beige adipocyte differentiation and activation. Depletion of Foxp4 in progenitor cells impaired beige cell early differentiation. However, we observed that ablation of Foxp4 in differentiated adipocytes profoundly potentiated their thermogenesis upon cold exposure. Of note, the outcome of Foxp4-deficiency on UCP1-mediated thermogenesis was confined to beige adipocytes, rather than to brown adipocytes. Taken together, we submit that FOXP4 primes beige adipocyte early differentiation, but attenuates their activation by potent transcriptional repression of the thermogenic program.
FOXP4 differentially controls cold-induced beige adipocyte differentiation and thermogenesis
- Award Group:
- Funder(s): ok
- Award Id(s): 2020YFA0803601
- Funder(s):
- Award Group:
- Funder(s): Natural Science Foundation of China
- Award Id(s): 92068203
- Funder(s):
Currently Viewing Accepted Manuscript - Newer Version Available
Fuhua Wang, Shuqin Xu, Tienan Chen, Shifeng Ling, Wei Zhang, Shaojiao Wang, Rujiang Zhou, Xuechun Xia, Zhengju Yao, Pengxiao Li, Xiaodong Zhao, Jiqiu Wang, Xizhi Guo; FOXP4 differentially controls cold-induced beige adipocyte differentiation and thermogenesis. Development 2022; dev.200260. doi: https://doi.org/10.1242/dev.200260
Download citation file:
Advertisement
Call for papers: Uncovering Developmental Diversity
Development invites you to submit your latest research to our upcoming special issue: Uncovering Developmental Diversity. This issue will be coordinated by our academic Editor Cassandra Extavour (Harvard University, USA) alongside two Guest Editors: Liam Dolan (Gregor Mendel Institute of Molecular Plant Biology, Austria) and Karen Sears (University of California Los Angeles, USA).
Choose Development in 2024
In this Editorial, Development Editor-in-Chief James Briscoe and Executive Editor Katherine Brown explain how you support your community by publishing in Development and how the journal champions serious science, community connections and progressive publishing.
Journal Meeting: From Stem Cells to Human Development
Register now for the 2024 Development Journal Meeting From Stem Cells to Human Development. Early-bird registration deadline: 3 May. Abstract submission deadline: 21 June.
Pluripotency of a founding field: rebranding developmental biology
This collaborative Perspective, the result of a workshop held in 2023, proposes a set of community actions to increase the visibility of the developmental biology field. The authors make recommendations for new funding streams, frameworks for collaborations and mechanisms by which members of the community can promote themselves and their research.
Read & Publish Open Access publishing: what authors say
We have had great feedback from authors who have benefitted from our Read & Publish agreement with their institution and have been able to publish Open Access with us without paying an APC. Read what they had to say.