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Updated: Aug 29, 2025

The Extraction of Liver Glycogen Molecules for Glycogen Structure Determination
Published on: February 8, 2022
The fragility of liver glycogen from humans with type 2 diabetes: A pilot study
Ziyi Wang1, Xiaobo Min2, Zhenxia Hu3
1Department of Pharmacy, Union Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, Hubei 430030, China; Centre for Nutrition and Food Sciences, Queensland Alliance for Agriculture and Food Innovation, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Queensland 4072, Australia.
Abstract:
Liver glycogen is a highly branched glucose polymer found as β particles (~20 nm in diameter), which can bind together into larger composite α particles. Hepatic α particles have been shown to be structurally fragile (breaking up into smaller particles in certain solvents) in mouse models of diabetes; if occurring in vivo, the resulting small glycogen particles could exacerbate the poor blood-sugar homeostasis characteristic of the disease. Here we tested if this α-particle fragility also occurred in liver glycogen obtained from humans with diabetes. It was found that liver glycogen from diabetic humans was indeed more fragile than from non-diabetic humans, which was also seen in the mouse experiments we ran in parallel. Proteomic analysis revealed three candidate proteins from differentially expressed glycogen proteins (Diabetes/ Non-diabetes) in both human and mouse groups. Identifying these proteins may give clues to the binding mechanism that holds together α particles together, which, being different in diabetic glycogen, is relevant to diabetes prevention and management.
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