Endocrine Abstracts

IntroductionEpidemiological studies have suggested that obesity during childhood increases the risk of developing metabolic comorbidities, such as type 2 diabetes, later in life. Childhood obesity is a complex disease whose molecular mechanisms are not completely elucidated. However, studies have demonstrated that approximately 65% of the variation associated with obesity is due to genetic factors. In this context, a system biology approach could contrib...

Background and aims: Diabetic retinopathy (DR) is an important chronic complication of diabetes mellitus (DM), and is the leading cause of new cases of blindness in adults. Although several single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) have been associated with DR, more information is needed to unravel the genetics of this complex disease. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are a class of small noncoding RNAs that regulate expression of at least 60% of all protein-coding genes. A number of miRNAs ha...

Background and Aims: Type 1 diabetes mellitus (T1DM) is caused by an autoimmune destruction of pancreatic beta cells, which renders patients insulin-dependent for life. The disease arises from a complex interaction among several genetic and environmental factors. To date, single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in >50 genes have been associated with T1DM, with HLA class II SNPs having the greatest impact on disease susceptibility. Other loci have minor effects on T...