An enzyme in the brain plays a key role in sensing and controlling levels of glucose in the blood – the underlying mechanism that it triggers appears to link to both type 1 and type 2 diabetes. [s]Medical News Today[/s] reports that researchers have discovered the enzyme – known as prolyl endopeptidase (PREP) – communicates with the pancreas as well as sensing levels of glucose in the blood. Lead author Sabrina Diano, a professor in the [b]Departments of Obstetrics, Gynecology & Reproductive Sciences, Comparative Medicine, and Neurobiology at Yale University School of Medicine[/b] and her colleagues conclude that: ‘Taken together, our results unmask a previously unknown player in central regulation of glucose metabolism and pancreatic function.’ Diano says that finding the targets in the enzyme that make the neurons sends changes in glucose levels could lead to a new type of drug to regulate insulin secretion that could not only treat type 2 diabetes, ‘but perhaps even prevent it.’
[link url=http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/280465.php]Full Medical News Today report[/link]
[link url=http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2014/07/23/1406000111.abstract?sid=fc11b6dd-30f2-4962-977c-25d2f5559527]PNAS abstract[/link]