Lack of cholesterol mobilization in islets of hormone-sensitive lipase deficient mice impairs insulin secretion.
The observations that hormone-sensitive lipase (HSL) is located in close association to insulin granules in beta-cells and that cholesterol ester hydrolase activity is completely blunted in islets of HSL null mice made us hypothesize that the role of HSL in beta-cells is to provide cholesterol for the exocytosis of insulin. To test this hypothesis, wild type (wt) and HSL null islets were depleted
