Glucose transporters in the metabolic syndrome

Intra- and extra-cellular glucose homeostasis is directly related to gene expression control of different isoforms, which encode different glucose transporters, being tissue-specifically expressed, as a consequence of transcriptional factors activity of each gene, in each cellular type. The metabolic syndrome (MS) comprises a wide range of physiopathological abnormalities, all involved in systemic changes, which occur in different territories of the body, where glucose transporters changes are observed in diverse degrees. The present review will describe the glucose transporters expression changes clearly shown in literature, which reflexes in glucose flow, and can facilitate the MS physiopathological understanding, as well as possible treatments for the syndrome.

Glucose transporter; GLUT; GLUT4; Metabolic syndrome; Insulin resistance