Overspill of Fat Shown to Cause Type 2 Diabetes
upstart writes in with an IRC submission for chromas:
Overspill of fat shown to cause Type 2 diabetes:
For the first time, scientists have been able to observe people developing Type 2 diabetes-and confirmed that fat over-spills from the liver into the pancreas, triggering the chronic condition.
The research, led by Professor Roy Taylor at Newcastle University, UK, is published today in the academic journal, Cell Metabolism.
The study involved a group of people from Tyneside who previously had Type 2 diabetes but had lost weight and successfully reversed the condition as part of the DiRECT trial, which was funded by Diabetes UK and led by Professors Roy Taylor and Mike Lean (Glasgow University).
The majority remained non-diabetic for the rest of the two year study, however, a small group went on to re-gain the weight and re-developed Type 2 diabetes.
Professor Roy Taylor, from the Newcastle University Institute of Translational and Clinical Research, explained what the advanced scanning techniques and blood monitoring revealed.
He said: "We saw that when a person accumulates too much fat, which should be stored under the skin, then it has to go elsewhere in the body. The amount that can be stored under the skin varies from person to person, indicating a 'personal fat threshold' above which fat can cause mischief.
"When fat cannot be safely stored under the skin, it is then stored inside the liver, and over-spills to the rest of the body including the pancreas. This 'clogs up' the pancreas, switching off the genes which direct how insulin should effectively be produced, and this causes Type 2 diabetes."
This research by Professor Taylor confirms his Twin Cycle Hypothesis-that Type 2 diabetes is caused by excess fat actually within both the liver and pancreas, and especially that this process is reversible.
Read more of this story at SoylentNews.