What do we know about diabetes? There are two types of diabetes type 1 diabetes and type 2 diabetes Diabetes causes blood sugar to become too high Untreated diabetes can cause serious complications In 2010 there were 3.1 million people with diabetes. 15% have type 1 diabetes and around 85% have type 2. How many people have each type of diabetes?

Type 1 diabetes- 3.1 million ÷100 = million(<- this is 1%) 0.031million x 15 = (x by 15 to get 15%) million or 465,000- ALMOST HALF A MILLION Type 2 diabetes – 3.1 million ÷100 = million(<- this is 1%) million x 85 = (x by 85 to get 85%) million or 2,635,000 And research predicts these numbers are rising rapidly.

How diabetes is treated Type 1 Diabetes Onset can be fast Most diagnosed when young Insulin dependant – these patients require insulin injections to maintain normal blood sugar Type 2 Diabetes Onset is slower Mainly in older and obese people Can be managed with diet and exercise.

There are problems with using insulin injections as a treatment for type 1 diabetes? Could you think of any? -Inconvenient -Treatment not a cure - Not a continuous supply, the body naturally releases insulin in exactly the right amounts when it is required

What do scientists measure to see if their diabetes experiments have worked? This test is the Oral Glucose Tolerance Test (OGTT) The test measures changes in blood glucose levels after a controlled amount of glucose has been eaten (called a glucose load). The patient must fast (not eat any food) for 12 hours before the test Blood sugar is measured at 30 minute intervals for 2 hours

The data provided is based on human results of the OGTT. The World Health Organisation (WHO) say a person without diabetes should have: Fasting value (before test): under 6.1 mM and normal values are from 3.9 to 5.5 mM At 2 hours: under 7.8 mM Are any of the data sets in this group diabetic?

Oral Glucose Tolerance Test OGTT Blood Glucose (mM) Time (minutes)

Can you label each point on your graph to show what might be happening?

Blood Glucose (mM) Time (minutes)

Scientists are looking for a cure Stem Cells – cells with the ability to turn into any cells in the body. Using stem cells scientists are trying to make pancreas cells which can be transplanted into diabetic patients. In the end this could offer a cure Gao et al. 2014

Things are not always as straight forward as they seem in the world of science. To compare these graphs we need to convert the units. To convert from mg/dl to mM we must times by Raikwar, S. P. and Zavazava, N. (2011).

TimeBlood Glucose mg/dlBlood Glucose mM TimeBlood Glucose mg/dlBlood Glucose mM TimeBlood Glucose mg/dlBlood Glucose mM Things are not always as straight forward as they seem in the world of science. To compare these graphs we need to convert the units. To convert from mg/dl to mM we must times by Raikwar and Zavazava (2011)

Compare this graph to the one you have produced for a human OGTT

Blood Glucose (mM) Time (minutes)

Are there many similarities? What are the differences? Could you think of any reasons for these differences?

What are the benefits of using mice models? What are the drawbacks of using a mouse model to experiment on human disease?

References Raikwar, S. P. and Zavazava, N. (2011). Spontaneous in vivo differentiation of embryonic stem cell-derived pancreatic endoderm- like cells corrects hyperglycemia in diabetic mice. Transplantation 91:11. Gao, X., Song, L., Shen, K., Wang, H., Niu, W., Qin, X. and Qian, M. (2014). Bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells promote the repair of islets from diabetic mice through paracrine actions. Molecular and Cellular Endocrinology 388: World Health Organisation.

Blood Glucose (mM) Time (minutes)