Study: Serotonin, the Mastermind Behind Gestational Diabetes
Scientists could be one step closer to finding out the cause of gestational diabetes, a form of diabetes that is triggered by pregnancy. Serotonin, a neurotransmitter better known as a feel good chemical in the brain, has a direct effect on the blood glucose disorder in pregnant mice, said a UCSF-led team of international researchers. Further, the amount of dietary protein ingested during the early stages of pregnancy appears to influence the levels of serotonin.
The findings, which will be published in an upcoming issue of Nature Medicine, could lead to simple dietary solutions and possible therapeutics to reverse the disorder, said the researchers. The discovery could also pave the way for new solutions to treat early non-gestational diabetes, such as type 2 diabetes.
For decades, scientists have been perplexed by the cause of gestational diabetes, a condition which affects some four percent, or 135,000, of pregnant women in the United States each year.
To find out the cause, researchers scanned the genes in pancreatic cells (known as islet cells) of pregnant and non-pregnant mice to see which got turned on and which were turned off. There are several types of cells in an islet, one of which is beta cells that produce the hormone insulin. Surprisingly, they found that tryptophan hydroxylase, the enzyme that produces serotonin, increased significantly in the beta cells. The levels of serotonin also shot up 1,000-fold in newly pregnant mice.
"We had shown that islet cells had all the 'machinery' for producing serotonin, but we thought it was coincidental," said Professor Michael German, MD, senior author of the paper. "What this paper shows is not only does the gene for synthesizing serotonin increase, but also the amount of serotonin in the beta cells increases 1,000-fold during pregnancy."
The team elaborated that, "Because serotonin is made from tryptophan — an amino acid that comes from high-protein foods such as milk, eggs, meat and fish — this result also provides a clear link between the amount and type of protein consumed by the mother early in pregnancy and the generation of islet cells needed to protect her against gestational diabetes late in pregnancy."
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