New clues in the fight against diabetes
24 November 2008
Scientists have discovered a mechanism that could help treat diabetes. Investigating the disease in mice, they've found out how our bodies grow new pancreas cells - a process that goes wrong in people with diabetes. Antenna finds out more...
This research was published in the journal Science on 21 November 2008.
This research was published in the journal Science on 21 November 2008.
People who suffer from diabetes have too much sugar in their blood, meaning their cells are starved of energy.
Image: Beth Sobel
There are more than 2.5 million people with diabetes in the UK. Diabetics lack, or can't use, a hormone called insulin which helps sugar enter the body's cells. The most common form of diabetes is known as type 2, which is strongly linked with obesity.
As waistlines in rich countries have increased, so have numbers of people with type 2 diabetes.
Image: Ludovic Rhodes/iStockphoto
The cells of obese people are crammed so full of energy that they ignore signals from insulin telling them to take up sugar from the blood. This 'insulin resistance' leads to a rise in blood sugar level.
Normally, the body copes with this excess sugar by growing more insulin-producing cells in the pancreas. But if it stops growing these cells, the blood sugar level stays high and the individual ends up with type 2 diabetes.
Insulin is a hormone produced by cells in the pancreas.
Image: Science Photo Library
'We studied what controls the growth of insulin-producing cells in the pancreas in obese mice and discovered that nerves are responsible. Once we'd identified these nerves we were able to turn on the mechanism to grow insulin-producing cells again.' Hideki Katagiri, diabetes expert
Hideki Katagiri, Tohoku University, Japan.
Image: Hideki Katagiri
What does this mean for people with diabetes?
'Now we understand what controls the growth of cells that supply insulin, we can hopefully identify what is going wrong in people with type 2 diabetes. It will help find ways to fix it.' Michael Christie, diabetes expert
'However, one of the main causes of type 2 diabetes is eating too much for the amount of exercise we get, so if we're going to beat this disease it's very important that people change their lifestyles.'
Michael Christie, King's College London.
Image: Michael Christie
Good news for type 2, but what about type 1 diabetes?
The team say their discovery might also offer a new way of treating type 1 diabetes. In this form of the disease, insulin-producing cells in the pancreas are destroyed by the body's immune system. When the scientists activated the mechanism to grow new cells in mice that had their insulin-producing cells removed, the cells grew back.
The scientists studied diabetes using obese mice.
Image: Oak Ridge National Laboratory/US Department of Energy/Science Photo Library
What do other experts think?
'With type 1 diabetes the immune system is constantly attacking the insulin-producing cells in the pancreas, so any new cells would be destroyed unless the immune system was suppressed.' Michael Christie, diabetes expert
'Scientists are working to find a way to block the immune response that causes type 1 diabetes. If they're successful then getting new cells to grow could be very useful. But it's likely to be a long way off.'
People with type 1 diabetes have to inject themselves with insulin every day.
Image: Diabetes UK