Abstract 558: PCPE2 Promotes Adipocyte Maturation via Regulation of SR-BI Activity

Abstract

Procollagen C-endopeptidase enhancer protein 2 (PCPE2) is an enhancer protein that enhances the cleavage of the C-termini of procollagen by bone morphogenetic protein 1. But the function of PCPE2 is not limited to collagen maturation. Recently our lab reported that PCPE2 increased HDL-associated cholesteryl ester uptake via scavenger receptor class B type 1 (SR-BI), an HDL cholesterol receptor highly expressed in adipose tissue. Interestingly, TwinsUK study in human provided data showing that PCPE2 mRNA is highly correlated with adipose tissue distribution. Further, our lab observed a reduced size of visceral fat pad in PCPE2 deficient mice despite its indifference in body weight compared to the wild type. To study the molecular and cellular mechanisms of how PCPE2 regulates SR-BI function and how it affects adipose tissue formation, we generated PCPE2 knockout (PCPE2 -/- ) cell line from murine preadipocyte 3T3-L1 cell using CRISPR-Cas9 technology. Induction of 3T3-L1 cell to differentiate into mature adipocyte increases the expression of both PCPE2 and SR-BI hand in hand around 3 fold, which parallels the process of lipid droplet formation. Immunofluorescence studies showed that PCPE2 is distributed all over the cell in mature adipocyte, while SR-BI is mostly distributed along the cytoplasmic and lipid droplet membranes, in addition to the perinuclear region. More interestingly, PCPE2 -/- 3T3-L1 cell shows an impairment in lipid droplet formation during the induction of differentiation, with less than 10% of cells generating lipid droplets, and the size of lipid droplet being only about 50% of that in wild type. Although PCPE2 -/- 3T3-L1 cell expresses SR-BI at a higher level compared with wild type cell, nearly 50% of the SR-BI in wild type cell are in homodimer structure while PCPE2 -/- 3T3-L1 cell has almost none SR-BI multimer, indicating that SR-BI in PCPE2 -/- 3T3-L1 cell is inactive. Taken together, we concluded that PCPE2 plays a critical role in keeping SR-BI in active conformation, which, in turn, controls adipocyte maturation. Whether this effect is associated with collagen maturation will be assessed in our future studies.