G protein coupled receptor kinases modulate Caenorhabditis elegans reactions to heat stresses

Abstract

In this report, we explored if G protein coupled receptor kinases (GRKs) can help modulate the heat stress responses of Caenorhabditis (C.) elegans. Loss of function grk-2 C. elegans mutants were more tolerant to increases in heat and display an ability for heat stress-associated hormesis at a longer exposure time unlike the wild type N2 animals and the loss of function grk-1 C. elegans mutants. The loss of function grk-1 mutants recovered more from acute heat stress compared to the wild type N2 animals. Animals with low Ce-GRK2 protein expression showed increased DAF-16 nuclear localization during the early stages of heat stress exposure compared to the other RNAi-treated animals, demonstrating altered insulin/insulin-like growth factor signaling (IIS) pathway activity in response to the stress. pdk-1 and akt-1 may play key roles in conjunction with Ce-GRK2 in the heat stress response. Collectively, these findings demonstrate that GRKs influence C. elegans heat stress behaviors.