Doctors have long known that men with low testosterone levels are at a greater risk of developing type 2 diabetes. For the first time, researchers have identified how testosterone helps men regulate blood sugar through the activation of activation ofThe key signaling mechanisms in islets, groups of cells in the pancreas that produce insulin.The findings, written by researchers at the University of Tulane, are published in Cell Metabolism magazine.
"We have found the cause-and a path of potential treatment-for type 2 diabetes in men with testosterone deficiency," says the main author, Dr. Franck Mauvais-Jarvis, Price-Price Professor-Goldsmith in the Department of Medicine of Medicine ofThe Faculty of the University of Tulane Medicine.“Our study shows that testosterone is an anti-diabetic hormone in men.If we are able to modulate your action without side effects, it is a therapeutic route for type 2 diabetes. "
Research
The researchers used male mice raised especially with the beta cells of the pancreas that lack the testosterone receptor (the androgens receiver).They fed them with a western diet rich in fat and sugar and tested their response to glucose.The mice without androgen receptors developed a lower insulin secretion, which led them to a glucose intolerance compared to normal mice in the control group.
To better understand how testosterone interacted with the production of insulin in the pancreas, the researchers administered testosterone and glucose directly to the cells of the human islets treated with a androgen.In both cases the islet cells showed decrease in insulin production compared to islet cells whose receptor to testosterone was not inhibited or lacking.Undoubtedly, an investigation of which we will have to be very aware.
Cell metabolism
Dr. Franck Mauvais-Jarvis
University of Tulane