Disruption of O-GlcNAc cycling by deletion of O-GlcNAcase (Oga/Mgea5) changed gene expression pattern in mouse embryonic fibroblast (MEF) cells

Adding a single O-GlcNAc moiety to a Ser/Thr molecule of a protein by O-GlcNAc transferase and transiently removing it by O-GlcNAcase is referred to as O-GlcNAc cycling (or O-GlcNAcylation). This O-GlcNAc modification is sensitive to nutrient availability and also shows cross talk with phosphorylation signaling, affecting downstream targets. A mouse model system was developed and evaluated to show genome wide transcriptional changes associated with disruption of O-GlcNAc cycling. Mouse embryonic fibroblast cells derived from O-GlcNAcase (Oga) knock out (KO), heterozygous (Het) and wild type (WT) embryos were used for an Affymetrix based microarray. Results are deposited in GEO dataset GSE52721. Data reveals that Oga KO MEFs had 2534 transcripts differentially expressed at 1.5 fold level while Oga heterozygous MEFs had 959 transcripts changed compared to WT MEFs. There were 1835 transcripts differentially expressed at 1.5 fold Het versus WT comparison group. Gene ontology analysis indicated differentially expressed genes enriched in metabolic, growth, and cell proliferation categories.