Multiple Defects in the Adipocyte Glucose Transport System Cause Cellular Insulin Resistance in Gestational Diabetes: Heterogeneity in the Number and a Novel Abnormality in Subcellular Localization of GLUT4 Glucose Transporters

Mechanisms causing cellular insulin resistance in gestational diabetes mellitus are not known. We, therefore, studied isolated omental adipocytes obtained during elective cesarean sections in nondiabetic (control) and GDM gravidas. Cellular insulin resistance was attributed to impaired stimulation of glucose transport; compared with control subjects, basal and maximally insulin-stimulated transport rates (per surface area) were reduced 38 and 60% in GDM patients, respectively. To determine underlying mechanisms, we assessed the number, subcellular distribution, and translocation of GLUT4, the predominant insulin-responsive glucose transporter isoform. The cellular content of GLUT4 was decreased by 44% in GDM patients as assessed by immunoblot analysis of total postnuclear membranes. However, GDM patients segregated into two subgroups; half expected profound (76%) cellular depletion of GLUT4 and half had GLUT4 levels in the normal range. Cellular GLUT4 was negatively correlated with adipocyte size in the control subjects and GDM patients with normal GLUT4 (r = 0.60), but fell way below this continuum in GDM patients with low GLUT4, indicating that heterogeneity was not caused by differences in obesity. All GDM. distribution. In basal cells, increased amounts of GLUT4 were detected in membranes fractionating with (such that the plasma membrane GLUT4 level in GDM (such that the plasma membrane GLUT4 level in GDM patients was equal to that observed in insulin-stimulated cells from control subjects). Furthermore, insulin stimulation induced translocation of GLUT4 from low-density microsomes to plasma membranes in control subjects but did not alter subcellular distribution in GDM patients. In other experiments, cellular content of GLUT1 was normal in GDM patients, and GLUT1 did not undergo insulin-mediated recruitment to plasma membranes in either control subjects or GDM patients. A faint signal was detected for GLUT3 only in low-density microsomes and only with one of two different antibodies. In GDM, we conclude that insulin resistance in adipocytes involves impaired stimulation of glucose transport and arises from a heterogeneity of defects intrinsic to the glucose transport effector system. GLUT4 content in adipocytes is profoundly depleted in ∼50% of GDM patients, whereas all patients are found to exhibit a novel abnormality in GLUT4 subcellular distribution. This latter defect is characterized by accumulation of GLUT4 in membranes cofractionating with plasma membranes and high-density microsomes in basal cells and absence of translocation in response to insulin. The data suggest that abnormalities in cellular traffic or targeting relegate GLUT4 to a membrane compartment from which insulin cannot recruit transporters to the cell surface and have important implications regarding skeletal muscle insulin resistance in GDM and NIDDM.