Word: insulin
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Diabetic complications have also been linked to elevated levels of sorbitol, a sugary alcohol. Even in the absence of insulin, certain cells, such as those in the lens of the eye, continue to absorb glucose. But without insulin, glucose cannot be processed in the usual way; the cell instead converts it to sorbitol. The abnormal accumulation of sorbitol causes cell membranes to swell and leak. It also interferes with vital biochemical processes...
Even after complications develop, the prognosis is not unrelentingly grim. Laser surgery is saving eyesight. Bypass surgery is salvaging hearts and feet. Dialysis machines and organ transplants are pinch-hitting for nonfunctioning kidneys. Most important, insulin pumps and home-monitoring kits are enabling diabetics to control their blood-sugar levels more precisely than ever before. With good control, diabetic women, once cautioned not to have children, are now delivering healthy babies. Says Dr. Gordon Weir, medical director of the Joslin Diabetes Center: "Patients are finally tuning in to the fact that high blood sugar is serious business...
...depressive Newport heiress, with a frail hauteur in her demeanor and a well-stocked pharmacy in her purse. He, Danish-born and smartly foppish, living off her wealth and at her whim. Not Eurotrash exactly -- aristotrash. When in 1981 Claus was accused of attempting to murder Sunny with insulin injections, leaving her in a coma from which she has not emerged, the case yielded reams of tabloid tattle. Twice he was tried in Rhode Island courts: first found guilty and then, when he was defended by Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz and won a new trial on appeal, acquitted...
...been equipped with genes that scientists have borrowed from bacteria. Shrimp may soon be given disease-fighting genes taken from sea urchins. Eventually, crops and farm animals may be raised to produce not just food and clothing but also a wide array of chemical compounds and human proteins like insulin. While research on plants has taken the lead, work with farm animals does not lag far behind. Last year the Baylor College of Medicine and Houston- based Granada BioSciences succeeded in transplanting growth-promoter genes into cattle embryos. Granada now boasts four healthy calves, at least one of which appears...
...object of gene therapy, simply put, is to provide the body with healthy replacement genes that can fulfill the intended role of defective ones. "Gene therapy is actually a sophisticated drug-delivery system," Anderson explains. "Anything given now by injection -- growth factor, factor VIII, insulin -- you can just engineer the patient's own cells to pump them out. The advantage is that it's a one-time treatment...