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Nature Medicine 10, 584 - 585 (2004)
doi:10.1038/nm0604-584

Balancing muscle hypertrophy and atrophy

Eric P Hoffman1 & Gustavo A Nader1

  1. Eric P. Hoffman and Gustavo A. Nader are at the Research Center for Genetic Medicine, Children's National Medical Center, Washington, DC 20010, USA. e-mail: ehoffman@cnmcresearch.org or e-mail: gnader@cnmcresearch.org


The body carefully balances muscle atrophy and muscle hypertrophy in response to stimuli such as starvation or immobilization. Three new studies point to Akt1 phosphorylation of the transcription factor Foxo as a central regulator of this balance.


Loss of muscle tissue (atrophy) contributes substantially to many common health problems, ranging from aging to diabetes, HIV, cancer, space flight and spinal cord injury1. Research over the last several years has provided insights into specific molecular programs that govern muscle atrophy and a distinct set of pathways that governs muscle anabolic responses (hypertrophy).

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