Liraglutide stimulates the β-catenin signaling cascade in mouse epididymal fat tissue.

Although canonical Wnt signaling pathway activation was shown to negatively regulate adipogenesis, recent investigations suggest that Wnt pathway effectors TCF7L2 and β-catenin (β-cat) in adipose tissues are also involved in energy homeostasis during adulthood. In assessing metabolic beneficial effect of GLP-1-based diabetes-drugs in high fat diet (HFD) challenged mice, we observed that liraglutide treatment affected expression of a battery of adipose tissue-specific genes, including that encode adiponectin and leptin, mainly in epididymal white adipose tissue (eWAT). Fourteen-week HFD challenge repressed TCF7L2 and β-cat S675 phosphorylation in eWAT while such repression was reversed by liraglutide treatment (150 µg/kg body weight daily) during week 10 to week 14. In Glp1r-/- mice, liraglutide failed in stimulating TCF7L2 or β-cat in eWAT. We detected Glp1r expression in mouse eWAT and its level is enriched in its "stromal vascular fraction" (SVF). Mouse eWAT-SVF showed reduced expression of Tcf7l2 and its Tcf7l2 level could not be stimulated by liraglutide treatment; while following adipogenic differentiation, rat eWAT-SVF showed elevated Tcf7l2 expression. Direct in vitro liraglutide treatment in eWAT-SVF stimulated CREB S133, β-cat S675 phosphorylation, and cellular cAMP level. Thus, cAMP/β-cat signaling cascade can be stimulated by liraglutide in eWAT via GLP-1R expressed in eWAT-SVF.