Podocan promoting skeletal muscle post‐injury regeneration by inhibiting TGF‐β signaling pathway

Abstract Podocan, the fifth member of Small Leucine‐Rich Proteoglycan (SLRP) family of extracellular matrix components, is poorly known in muscle development. Previous studies have shown that Podocan promotes C2C12 differentiation in mice. In this study, we elucidated the effect of Podocan on skeletal muscle post‐injury regeneration and its underlying mechanism. Injection of Podocan protein promoted the process of mice skeletal muscle post‐injury regeneration. This effect seemed to be from the acceleration of muscle satellite cell differentiation in vivo. Meanwhile, Podocan promoted myogenic differentiation in vitro by binding with TGF‐β1 to inhibit the activity of the TGF‐β signaling pathway. These results indicated that Podocan had the potential roles to enhance skeletal muscle post‐injury regeneration. Its mechanism is likely the regulation of the expression of p‐Smad2 and p‐Smad4 related to the TGF‐β signaling pathway by interacting with TGF‐β1.