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Mechanisms Underlying Muscle Protein Imbalance Induced by Alcohol

Scot R Kimball1, Charles H Lang1

  • 1Department of Cellular and Molecular Physiology, Pennsylvania State University College of Medicine, Hershey, Pennsylvania 17033, USA; email: skimball@psu.edu , chl1@psu.edu.

Annual Review of Nutrition
|August 22, 2018
PubMed

Insights

Alcohol disrupts muscle metabolism by impairing the mechanistic target of rapamycin (mTOR) pathway, reducing protein synthesis and affecting muscle function. This impacts both skeletal and cardiac muscle, regardless of nutritional status.

Area of Science:

  • Muscle physiology and metabolism
  • Molecular signaling pathways
  • Alcohol-induced myopathies

Background:

  • Alcohol consumption negatively impacts skeletal and cardiac muscle function.
  • These effects are linked to disruptions in cellular metabolism, independent of malnutrition.
  • The mechanistic target of rapamycin (mTOR) pathway is a key regulator of muscle protein synthesis and is affected by alcohol.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To review recent advances in understanding mTOR signaling in muscle.
  • To compare alcohol's effects on mTOR in skeletal versus cardiac muscle.
  • To differentiate the impacts of acute versus chronic alcohol exposure on muscle metabolism.

Main Methods:

  • Review of current literature on alcohol's effects on muscle mTOR signaling.
  • Analysis of studies investigating protein synthesis and proteolysis pathways.
  • Examination of data on autophagy and ubiquitin-proteasome system activation.

Main Results:

  • Alcohol impairs mTOR signaling, decreasing protein synthesis in both skeletal and cardiac muscle.
  • Acute and chronic alcohol intake have distinct effects on muscle mTOR activity.
  • Alcohol's impact on proteolysis is less clear, but autophagy appears to be increased.

Conclusions:

  • Alcohol-induced impairment of mTOR signaling contributes to alcoholic myopathy.
  • Bidirectional changes in protein synthesis and autophagy play roles in muscle damage.
  • Further research is needed to clarify the roles of protein synthesis and autophagy in alcoholic myopathy.
Keywords:
alcoholic myopathyamino acidsautophagymTORprotein synthesistranslational controlubiquitin-proteasome pathway

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