insulin

The Robot Vacuum Ate My Pancreas!

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“A Roomba ate my pancreas!” It sounds like the plot of a weird sci-fi comedy. But in Dana Lewis’s life, this is just a normal day.

Lewis is one of the first people in America to create her own mechanical pancreas in an attempt to better manage her type 1 diabetes. (Her robotic vacuum cleaner keeps slurping up and choking on the system’s many cables.)

Type 1 diabetes is, at its simplest, a broken pancreas. Sometimes called juvenile diabetes, the autoimmune disease disables the pancreas from producing insulin, a key component for controlling blood sugar. People with Type 1 diabetes often have to use glucose monitors and insulin pumps to allow their bodies to function.

 

Read and listen at WNYC

‘Smart’ insulin hope for diabetes

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Scientists are hopeful that “smart” insulins which are undergoing trials could revolutionise the way diabetes is managed.

Instead of repeated blood tests and injections throughout the day to keep blood sugar in check, a single dose of smart insulin would keep circulating in the body and turn on when needed.

Animal studies show the technology appears to work – at least in mice.

Scientists plan to move to human trials soon, PNAS journal reports.

Experts caution that it will take years of testing before treatments could become a reality for patients.

 

 

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Type 2 diabetes drug switched on and off by blue light

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Diabetes drugs encourage the pancreas to release insulin to control blood sugar levels, but many of them cause side effects, affecting other organs such as the brain and heart. Some drugs, meanwhile, encourage too much insulin release, causing blood sugar levels to drop too much. Now, scientists have created a type 2 diabetes drug that can be switched on and off by blue light, potentially improving treatment.
human body with pancreas and diabetes
In type 2 diabetes, the body builds resistance to insulin, requiring more insulin to bring down blood glucose levels. As such, the pancreas needs to produce more insulin than it normally would.

The researchers – from the Department of Medicine at Imperial College London in the UK and LMU Munich in Germany – publish their findings in the journal Nature Communications.

They note that type 2 diabetes, which impairs an individual’s control over their blood sugar levels, affects about 350 million people around the world. The disease can lead to a higher risk of heart disease and stroke, causing potential damage to the kidneys, nerves and retinas.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), in 2012, 29.1 million people in the US – 9.3% of the population – had diabetes.

The disease involves a disturbance of normal glucose homeostasis caused by a failure of the pancreas’ beta cell mass to compensate for increased insulin resistance. However, in their new study, the researchers show that their prototype drug – called JB253 – stimulates insulin release from pancreatic cells when exposed to blue light.

 

Full story at MNT

 

Are we fat because we overeat, or do we overeat because we’re fat?

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FOR most of the last century, our understanding of the cause of obesity has been based on immutable physical law. Specifically, it’s the first law of thermodynamics, which dictates that energy can neither be created nor destroyed. When it comes to body weight, this means that calorie intake minus calorie expenditure equals calories stored. Surrounded by tempting foods, we overeat, consuming more calories than we can burn off, and the excess is deposited as fat. The simple solution is to exert willpower and eat less.

New York Times