{"doi":"10.17615/9bva-0f38","title":"β-Catenin Levels Influence Rapid Mechanical Responses in Osteoblasts","abstract":"Mechanical loading of bone initiates an anabolic, anticatabolic pattern of response, yet the molecular events involved in mechanical signal transduction are not well understood. Wnt/β-catenin signaling has been recognized in promoting bone anabolism, and application of strain has been shown to induce β-catenin activation. In this work, we have used a preosteoblastic cell line to study the effects of dynamic mechanical strain on β-catenin signaling. We found that mechanical strain caused a rapid, transient accumulation of active β-catenin in the cytoplasm and its translocation to the nucleus. This was followed by up-regulation of the Wnt/β-catenin target genes Wisp1 and Cox2, with peak responses at 4 and 1 h of strain, respectively. The increase of β-catenin was temporally related to the activation of Akt and subsequent inactivation of GSK3β, and caveolin-1 was not required for these molecular events. Application of Dkk-1, which disrupts canonical Wnt/LRP5 signaling, did not block strain-induced nuclear translocation of β-catenin or up-regulation of Wisp1 and Cox2 expression. Conditions that increased basal β-catenin levels, such as lithium chloride treatment or repression of caveolin-1 expression, were shown to enhance the effects of strain. In summary, mechanical strain activates Akt and inactivates GSK3β to allow β-catenin translocation, and Wnt signaling through LRP5 is not required for these strain-mediated responses. Thus, β-catenin serves as both a modulator and effector of mechanical signals in bone cells.","journal":"UNC Libraries","year":2020,"id":141149,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":0,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9565,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2020-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":289946,"name":"Ted S. Gross","orcid":"0000-0003-1545-6898","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":348009,"name":"Zhihui Xie","orcid":"0000-0002-1556-0700","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":348008,"name":"Buer Sen","orcid":"0000-0002-0487-7817","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":348014,"name":"Janet Rubin","orcid":"0000-0003-3534-8667","position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":436872,"name":"Natasha Case","orcid":null,"position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":607120,"name":"Meiyun Ma","orcid":null,"position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":0,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-18T23:17:24.429854Z","pmid":null,"pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}