Type 2 diabetes mellitus as a prion disease (literature review)

Abstract

Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) is the most common endocrine disease characterized by impaired insulin, hyperglycemia and chronic insulin resistance due to dysfunction and loss of β-cells of the islets of Largenhans. It is believed that the accumulation of unbound aggregates of islet amyloid polypeptide IAPP (islet amyloid polypeptide) on the islets of Langerhans may play a role in damage to the pancreas; therefore, type 2 diabetes mellitus is a degenerative disease in which there is an erroneous folding and aggregation of amyloid tissues in different cells. This group of diseases also includes Alzheimer’s disease (AD), Parkinson’s disease (PD), Huntington’s disease (HD), as well as more than 25 other rare diseases. Amyloid proteins in the body do not begin to aggregate by themselves, as a result of infection. These proteins can act as infectious agents - prions. In this article, we will consider the role of a misfire protein in the development of T2DM and the possibility of prion-like transmission of T2DM-associated protein aggregates.

Keywords

• type 2 diabetes mellitus (t2dm)
• iapp (islet amyloid polypeptide)
• prion proteins