High Fat Diet can Trigger Type 2 Diabetes

Mon, 15 Aug 2011
American researchers state that they have pinpointed how a high-fat diet can be a trigger for type 2 diabetes.

They have done this via experiments with mice and with human tissue. A related article in the journal Nature Medicine claims that fat intervenes with the body's sugar sensors.

The authors assert that if they had a deeper understanding of the processes involved this could enable them to develop a cure.

A key risk factor for type 2 diabetes is being overweight; increasing levels of obesity have led to a doubling of diabetes cases in the last three decades.

Blood sugar is monitored by pancreatic beta cells. Should blood sugar levels get too high then the pancreatic cells release the hormone insulin which instructs the body to lower the levels.

The key here is the enzyme GnT-4a; it enables the cells to absorb glucose and thus know how much is in the blood.

The specification of the molecular players in the development of diabetes intimates new therapeutic targets and ways of managing, preventing and even perhaps curing the condition.

The American researchers have demonstrated the way in which fat disrupts the enzyme's production.

Experiments on mice have illustrated how a high-fat diet has increased levels of free fatty acids in the blood.

These fatty acids disrupted two proteins, FOXA2 and HNF1A, which are involved in the production of GnT-4a.

The resultant fat increased blood sugar levels and the mice demonstrated multiple symptoms of type 2 diabetes.

From these results it may be sensible to boost GnT-4a levels in order to prevent type 2 diabetes developing.

Link to this page

Copy and Paste the following HTML into your page.