Skeletal muscle atrophy is a common and debilitating condition that lacks an effective
therapy. To address this problem, we used a systems-based discovery strategy to search for
a small molecule whose mRNA expression signature negatively correlates to mRNA
expression signatures of human skeletal muscle atrophy. This strategy identified a natural
small molecule from tomato plants, tomatidine. Using cultured skeletal myotubes from both
humans and mice, we found that tomatidine stimulated mTORC1 signaling and anabolism …