Grant: Foundation Grant

Over half of Canadians are overweight or obese. Obesity leads to higher levels of blood insulin and glucose. These are features of prediabetes, which leads to type 2 diabetes. Diabetes has serious consequences to our health and economy. Even prediabetes contributes to over 2 million annual deaths worldwide. Existing treatments help control blood sugar usually by increasing insulin. However, existing treatments focus on glucose, but do not address the root cause of prediabetes progression during obesity. Higher insulin can accelerate obesity and promote "insulin resistance". The discovery of insulin has saved many lives by controlling blood sugar. Now we need to stop the progression of prediabetes. After every meal or snack containing sugars, insulin is secreted and then cleared from the blood. Obesity slows clearance of insulin, exposing the body to more insulin. This can add up over time to further worsen obesity and prediabetes. Drugs that change insulin clearance all the time (not just after a meal) have failed and we still do not have good weight loss drugs that change eating behaviour or the body's ability to burn more energy. It is very important to discover ways to reduce the repeated exposure of the body to prolonged insulin after each meal. A key problem was that we did not understand enough about what changes insulin levels after eating. My lab discovered that bacteria in the gut produce factors that can lower insulin. The trillions of bacteria in our gut are an untapped source of new drugs. My lab has already found one part of bacteria that makes insulin work better. The next step is finding out how bacteria are sensed by the immune system to alter insulin. This research will combine unique resources across Canada to find out which parts of bacteria can be used to stop or slow prediabetes. This research may lead to new ways to target insulin and the development of prediabetes, which are different from the current drugs that focus on blood glucose.