Cardiomyocyte-Specific Deletion of GCN5L1 Limits Cardiac Contractile Decline in Obese Pre-Diabetic Mice

Reduced substrate flexibility, and a shift towards increased cardiac fatty acid utilization, is a key feature of obesity and diabetes. We previously reported that increased acetylation of several mitochondrial FAO enzymes, regulated in part via increased abundance of the mitochondrial acetyltransferase GCN5L1, correlated with increased FAO enzyme activity in the heart. The focus of the current study was to investigate whether decreased acetylation, via cardiomyocyte-specific deletion of GCN5L1 (GCN5L1 cKO), regulates cardiac energy metabolism following exposure to a high fat diet (HFD). Excess dietary fat led to similar cardiac hypertrophy in wildtype and GCN5L1 cKO mice. We show that acetylation of pyruvate dehydrogenase (PDH) was significantly reduced in HFD GCN5L1 cKO hearts, which correlated with its increased enzymatic activity relative to HFD wildtype controls. The acetylation of both electron transport chain Complex I protein NDUFB8, and manganese superoxide dismutase 2 (SOD2), was significantly reduced by GCN5L1 deletion in HFD animals, resulting in decreased lipid peroxidation. Finally, we show that in contrast to wildtype mice, GCN5L1 cKO hearts maintain ex vivo contractility and workload in response to a HFD. In summary, we show that GCN5L1 deletion limits cardiac functional decline observed in HFD mice, by increasing fuel substrate flexibility and limiting reactive oxygen species damage.