Pericardial adipose tissue (PAT), a visceral fat depot enveloping the heart, is an active endocrine organ and a source of free fatty acids and inflammatory cytokines. As in other fat adult tissues, PAT contains a population of adipose stem cells; however, whether these cells and/or their environment play a role in physiopathology is unknown. We analyzed several stem cell‐related properties of pericardial adipose stem cells (PSCs) isolated from obese and ex‐obese mice. We also performed RNA‐sequencing to profile the transcriptional landscape of PSCs isolated from the different diet regimens. Finally, we tested whether these alterations impacted on the properties of cardiac mesoangioblasts isolated from the same mice. We found functional differences between PSCs depending on their source: specifically, PSCs from obese PSC (oPSC) and ex‐obese PSC (dPSC) mice showed alterations in apoptosis and migratory capacity when compared with lean, control PSCs, with increased apoptosis in oPSCs and blunted migratory capacity in oPSCs and dPSCs. This was accompanied by different gene expression profiles across the cell types, where we identified some genes altered in obese conditions, such as BMP endothelial cell precursor‐derived regulator (BMPER), an important regulator of BMP‐related signaling pathways for endothelial cell function. The importance of BMPER in PSCs was confirmed by loss‐ and gain‐of‐function studies. Finally, we found an altered production of BMPER and some important chemokines in cardiac mesoangioblasts in obese conditions. Our findings point to BMPER as a potential new regulator of PSC function and suggest that its dysregulation could be associated with obesity and may impact on cardiac cells.

中文翻译：

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BMPER 在肥胖症中上调，似乎在心包脂肪干细胞中起作用。

心包脂肪组织 (PAT) 是一种包裹心脏的内脏脂肪库，是一种活跃的内分泌器官，也是游离脂肪酸和炎性细胞因子的来源。与其他成人脂肪组织一样，PAT 含有大量脂肪干细胞；然而，这些细胞和/或其环境是否在病理生理学中起作用尚不清楚。我们分析了从肥胖和超重小鼠中分离的心包脂肪干细胞 (PSC) 的几种干细胞相关特性。我们还进行了 RNA 测序，以分析从不同饮食方案中分离出的 PSC 的转录图谱。最后，我们测试了这些改变是否影响从相同小鼠中分离的心脏中成血管细胞的特性。我们发现 PSC 之间的功能差异取决于它们的来源：具体来说，与瘦的对照 PSC 相比，来自肥胖 PSC (oPSC) 和超重 PSC (dPSC) 小鼠的 PSC 显示出细胞凋亡和迁移能力的改变，其中 oPSC 的凋亡增加，而 oPSC 和 dPSC 的迁移能力减弱。这伴随着跨细胞类型的不同基因表达谱，我们发现了一些在肥胖条件下发生改变的基因，例如 BMP 内皮细胞前体衍生调节剂 (BMPER)，这是 BMP 相关内皮细胞功能信号通路的重要调节剂。BMPER 在 PSC 中的重要性已通过功能损失和功能获得研究得到证实。最后，我们发现肥胖条件下心脏中成血管细胞中 BMPER 和一些重要趋化因子的产生发生改变。