AKT1 and metabolic syndrome: We stimulated cardiomyocytes with increasing insulin concentrations (0.1–1000 nM) and found a significant increase in Akt phosphorylation at serine 473 at higher concentration of insulin in MetS cardiomyocytes (100 nM insulin) than in control cardiomyocytes (10 nM insulin), showing a right shift in the concentration-response curve (control EC50 = 10 nM, MetS EC50 = 47 nM) which indicates a diminished insulin sensitivity in terms of Akt activation in MetS cardiomyocytes (Fig 4A).