A research team has discovered the link that ties inflammation and diabetes, and it is set to challenge the commonly held belief of the medical community.
Type 2 diabetes is a metabolic disorder that affects more than 90% of the American population, many of whom remain undiagnosed. It is characterized by the body's resistance to insulin, a hormone produced by the pancreas.
Cells need blood sugar or glucose for energy, but sugar cannot get into these cells without the help of insulin. When a person has type 2 diabetes, the cells refuse to accept sugar from insulin, forcing the pancreas to produce more of this hormone. This then leads to high blood sugar called hyperglycemia. However, hyperglycemia doesn't just refer to the pancreas. It also has something to do with the liver.
In a normal body, insulin also prevents the production of glucose in the liver. This is reversed when a person has type 2 diabetes. Simply put, since the liver produces more glucose, the sugar in the blood also increases, resulting to hyperglycemia.
The current assumption is that glucose suppression in the liver is directly attributed to insulin's direct effect on the body's largest organ.
However, researchers from Yale School of Medicine led by Gerald Shulman discover a different process, which seems to challenge the present assumption. According to their study, insulin is able to supress the production of glucose in the liver level by preventing it from breaking down fat. Because the fat is not broken down, the liver also reduces the production of hepatic acetyl CoA, a molecule that helps convert lactate and amino acids to blood sugar.
However, an inflammation of the fatty tissue can reverse this process, which means the liver produces more of the key molecule. When more of it is produced, the more amino acids and lactate are converted to sugar. This then leads to high blood sugar. When the blood sugar is high, the pancreas is forced to create more insulin, which then leads to resistance.
With this new discovery, the researchers hope that future diabetes drugs will be more on target.
