Type 2 diabetes & obesity — what do we really know?

New Delhi, October 09, 2016: (UNI) As about ten per cent of the global population already have type 2 diabetes, or are likely to develop it, and 40 per cent of adults are overweight or obese, these conditions constitute major threats to human health around the world.

The heritability for obesity and type 2 diabetes is 70 and 35 per cent respectively.

The western lifestyle represents a culprit with a combination of excess calories, physical inactivity, sleep deprivation, endocrine disorders and smoking.

In a review in Science, Mark McCarthy, professor at the University of Oxford, UK, and Paul Franks, professor at Lund University, Sweden, examine the knowledge of the actual causes and the interplay between genetics and lifestyle factors.

By studying how our genes express themselves in response to environmental factors and changes in lifestyle, we will better understand how health recommendations and treatments can be tailored to each individual.

“Environmental factors that disturb cellular and physiological processes and have an effect on the individual’s predisposition to diseases, such as type 2 diabetes, are likely to do so through active, and reactive, modulation of genome function,” says Paul Franks.

“There is a compelling rationale behind this concept, but the details about how these processes work remain poorly defined.

” He says that there is emerging evidence that epigenomic changes such as DNA methylation and histone modifications, which affect the ways in which genes are transcribed and translated into proteins, are important features of these processes. –United News of India