J. Biol. Chem., Vol. 260, Issue 6, 3239-3242, Mar, 1985
Glucagon-stimulated phosphorylation of rat liver glycogen synthase in isolated hepatocytes
A Akatsuka, TJ Singh, H Nakabayashi, MC Lin and KP Huang
Addition of glucagon (20 nM) to the isolated hepatocytes from 24-h starved
male rats results in an inactivation of glycogen synthase. The A0.5 for
glucose-6-P is increased 2-fold over the control but the S0.5 for
UDP-glucose is not significantly affected. The glucagon-stimulated
inactivation of glycogen synthase is also accompanied by a 60-120% increase
in the phosphorylation of the synthase. Glycogen synthase labeled with 32P
by incubation of the hepatocytes with [32P] PO4(3-) was recovered by
immunoprecipitation and the resulting immunoprecipitate was subjected to
tryptic digestion. Analysis of the 32P-labeled peptides reveals that the
sites corresponding to those phosphorylated by cAMP-dependent protein
kinase and glycogen synthase (casein) kinase-1 (Itarte, E., and Huang,
K.-P. (1979) J. Biol. Chem. 254, 4052-4057) are rapidly phosphorylated in
response to glucagon. These results demonstrate that glucagon not only
triggers the activation of cAMP-dependent protein kinase through an
increase in the intracellular level of cAMP but also, by an unknown
mechanism, activates a Ca2+- and cAMP-independent protein kinase.