Review
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2016. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Diabetes. Feb 25, 2016; 7(4): 67-73
Published online Feb 25, 2016. doi: 10.4239/wjd.v7.i4.67
Glycosaminoglycan remodeling during diabetes and the role of dietary factors in their modulation
Vemana Gowd, Abhignan Gurukar, Nandini D Chilkunda
Vemana Gowd, Abhignan Gurukar, Nandini D Chilkunda, Department of Molecular Nutrition, CSIR-Central Food Technological Research Institute, Mysore 570 020, India
Author contributions: All the authors have contributed by searching for relevant literature and writing of the manuscript.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors hereby declare that they have no conflict-of -interest to state with respect to this paper.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Nandini D Chilkunda, PhD, Department of Molecular Nutrition, CSIR-Central Food Technological Research Institute, Mysore 570 020, India. cdnandini@cftri.res.in
Telephone: +91-821-2514192
Received: October 3, 2015
Peer-review started: October 9, 2015
First decision: November 10, 2015
Revised: November 23, 2015
Accepted: December 29, 2015
Article in press: January 4, 2016
Published online: February 25, 2016
Processing time: 144 Days and 0.9 Hours
Abstract

Glycosaminoglycans (GAGs) play a significant role in various aspects of cell physiology. These are complex polymeric molecules characterized by disaccharides comprising of uronic acid and amino sugar. Compounded to the heterogeneity, these are variously sulfated and epimerized depending on the class of GAG. Among the various classes of GAG, namely, chondroitin/dermatan sulfate, heparin/heparan sulfate, keratan sulfate and hyaluronic acid (HA), only HA is non-sulfated. GAGs are known to undergo remodeling in various tissues during various pathophysiological conditions, diabetes mellitus being one among them. These changes will likely affect their structure thereby impinging on their functionality. Till date, diabetes has been shown to affect GAGs in organs such as kidney, liver, aorta, skin, erythrocytes, etc. to name a few, with deleterious consequences. One of the mainstays in the treatment of diabetes is though dietary means. Various dietary factors are known to play a significant role in regulating glucose homeostasis. Furthermore, in recent years, there has been a keen interest to decipher the role of dietary factors on GAG metabolism. This review focuses on the remodeling of GAGs in various organs during diabetes and their modulation by dietary factors. While effect of diabetes on GAG metabolism has been worked out quite a bit, studies on the role of dietary factors in their modulation has been few and far between. We have tried our best to give the latest reports available on this subject.

Keywords: Glycosaminoglycans, Diabetes, Proteoglycans, Remodeling, Dietary factors

Core tip: Glycosaminoglycans/Proteoglycans are important polymeric molecules which play important roles in cell physiology. Under pathological conditions such as diabetes, they are known to undergo remodeling affecting their structure-function relationship. This review article deals with its remodeling in various tissues and their modulation by dietary factors.