SLC16A11 and HNF1A genes have a great influence in determining whether a person can suffer from type 2 diabetes or not.
This is revealed by studies by scientists from UNAM, the National Institute of Medical Sciences and Nutrition Salvador Zubirán, as well as the Broad Institute, in the United States.
To locate them, the specialists reviewed the genome of 8,200 people of Amerindio origin, that is, communities in various regions of Mexico, as well as Latinos in the United States with Mexican descent, to identify the genetic variants that give rise to chronic disease.
The first results revealed the two genes that were not registered in the large sequencing projects in the world (which have already been related to diabetes) and that are highly prevailing in Mexicans.
María Teresa Tusié Luna, a specialist at the Institute of Biomedical Research of the UNAM, explained that to find the genetic variants they reviewed a series of four amino acids inherited in group in the Mexican that have already been previously linked to a tendency to type 2 diabetes.
Even when these amino acids are present in all Amerindian populations, the UNAM specialist said that in populations of Canada and the United States, for example, they are not all, only a couple of them, while in the Mexican they are all.
The analysis led, first, to the identification of SLC16A11, whose finding was reported on December 24 in Nature magazine, added Dr. Carlos Aguilar Salinas.
"Before this identification there was no information on this gene. As part of the research we identify that it regulates the concentration of certain fats inside the cell, which is consistent with the current hypothesis on the pathophysiology of diabetes that is the cluster ofLipids in the tissues where fat usually accumulates, "he explained.
The carriers of SLC16A11 have 25 percent more possibilities of looking diabetes, and the risk increases to 50 percent in those people who have inherited it from both parents.
More recently, specialists reported the detection of HNF1A in the Journal of the American Medical Association, which increases the possibilities of a person to diabetes by 500 percent.
Karol Estrada, Mexican researcher at the Broad Institute of the United States, said that 2 percent of the population has this mutation that had already been related to a rare form of diabetes known as Mody, as it affects young people between 25 years.
The "advantage" of this second gene, he explained, is that it has been seen that carriers can be successfully treated with existing medications in the market, to which the metformin that is the most prescribed drug is currently replaced.
It is estimated that currently 14 percent of the population suffers from type 2 diabetes.