Identification of hypoglycemia-specific neural signals by decoding murine vagus nerve activity

Emily Battinelli Masi,
Todd Levy,
Tea Tsaava,
Chad E. Bouton,
Kevin J. Tracey,
Sangeeta S. Chavan†Email author and
Theodoros P. Zanos†Email author View ORCID ID profile

†Contributed equally

Bioelectronic Medicine20195:9

https://doi.org/10.1186/s42234-019-0025-z

Received: 25 April 2019
Accepted: 6 June 2019
Published: 11 July 2019

Abstract

Background

Glucose is a crucial energy source. In humans, it is the primary sugar for high energy demanding cells in brain, muscle and peripheral neurons. Deviations of blood glucose levels from normal levels for an extended period of time is dangerous or even fatal, so regulation of blood glucose levels is a biological imperative. The vagus nerve, comprised of sensory and motor fibres, provides a major anatomical substrate for regulating metabolism. While prior studies have implicated the vagus nerve in the neurometabolic interface, its specific role in either the afferent or efferent arc of this reflex remains elusive.

Methods

Here we use recently developed methods to isolate and decode specific neural signals acquired from the surface of the vagus nerve in BALB/c wild type mice to identify those that respond robustly to hypoglycemia. We also attempted to decode neural signals related to hyperglycemia. In addition to wild type mice, we analyzed the responses to acute hypo- and hyperglycemia in transient receptor potential cation channel subfamily V member 1 (TRPV1) cell depleted mice. The decoding algorithm uses neural signals as input and reconstructs blood glucose levels.

Results

Our algorithm was able to reconstruct the blood glucose levels with high accuracy (median error 18.6 mg/dl). Hyperglycemia did not induce robust vagus nerve responses, and deletion of TRPV1 nociceptors attenuated the hypoglycemia-dependent vagus nerve signals.

Conclusion

These results provide insight to the sensory vagal signaling that encodes hypoglycemic states and suggest a method to measure blood glucose levels by decoding nerve signals.