Menin: Cause of Gestational Diabetes?

Filed in archive Developments , Notable , Research on December 31, 2007

Some women develop diabetes during pregnancy (gestational diabetes) when the islets cells don't multiply and the body cannot meet the increased demand for insulin - thereby resulting to increases in blood sugar.

When a woman is pregnant, she needs to produce more insulin than usual because her body is feeding more cells than normal. A hormone, prolactin, which is abundant during pregnancy, causes more pancreatic islet cells to grow in order to produce the extra insulin.

A protein already known to prevent pancreatic cancer by blocking growth of pancreatic cells - called menin - may block the islet cells from multiplying in response to prolactin - resulting to gestational diabetes.

Such were the discovery of researchers from Stanford University.

When the researchers gave prolactin to normal non-pregnant mice, their menin levels dropped and their pancreases grew in size, just as if they were pregnant. But pregnant mice, genetically engineered to produce too much menin, couldn't make more islet cells and they developed gestational diabetes.

The scientists believe that prolactin lowers menin levels during pregnancy so that the body can make more islet cells. In cases of gestational diabetes, the menin appears to be unaffected by prolactin.

The scientists believe that menin may play a role in diabetes associated with obesity as well, possibly by sabotaging the body's attempt to make more islet cells to serve that extra body weight. They also believe that regulating menin could aid in the effort to grow new islet cells for transplantation.

Find more details from Diabetes Health.