Noncaloric monosaccharides induce excessive sprouting angiogenesis in zebrafish via foxo1a-marcksl1a signal

Abstract

Artificially sweetened beverages containing noncaloric monosaccharides were suggested as healthier alternatives to sugar-sweetened beverages. Nevertheless, the potential detrimental effects of these noncaloric monosaccharides on blood vessel function remain inadequately understood. Presently, we have established a zebrafish model that exhibits significant excessive angiogenesis induced by high glucose, resembling the hyperangiogenic characteristics observed in proliferative diabetic retinopathy (PDR). Utilizing this model, we observed that glucose and noncaloric monosaccharides could induce excessive formation of blood vessels, especially intersegmental vessels (ISVs). The excessively branched vessels were observed to be formed by ectopic activation of quiescent endothelial cells (ECs) into tip cells. Single-cell transcriptomic sequencing analysis of the endothelial cells in the embryos exposed to high glucose revealed an augmented ratio of capillary ECs, proliferating ECs, and a series of upregulated proangiogenic genes. Further analysis and experiments validated that foxo1a mediated the excessive angiogenesis induced by monosaccharides by down-regulating the expression of marcksl1a . This study has provided new evidence showing the negative effects of noncaloric monosaccharides on the vascular system and the underlying mechanisms.