Infographic: We know breastfeeding helps children. Now we know it helps mothers too

breastfeeding bed x facebook x
Credit: Healthline
This article or excerpt is included in the GLP’s daily curated selection of ideologically diverse news, opinion and analysis of biotechnology innovation.

When a woman becomes pregnant, her risk of type 2 diabetes increases for the rest of her life, perhaps because of her growing weight and rising insulin resistance. But if she breastfeeds, epidemiological studies have shown that the uptick in risk shrinks or disappears.

The mechanisms underlying this lactation perk have been unclear, but Michael German, a biologist at the University of California, San Francisco, hypothesized that the pancreas’s beta cells are involved. “For long-term protection over decades, you have to fundamentally change some part of the mechanism that controls blood sugar,” says German. “The best way to do that is by affecting the beta cell, because it makes the insulin.” Insulin helps glucose enter the body’s cells from the blood. But in type 2 diabetes, cells become insulin resistant and thus less able to absorb enough glucose, forcing the pancreas to make more insulin until it can’t keep up and blood sugar rises.

Related article:  Common vaccines appear to reduce risk of Alzheimer’s and cognitive decline
Follow the latest news and policy debates on agricultural biotech and biomedicine? Subscribe to our newsletter.

Through a series of knockout experiments in the animals, the team surmised that prolactin, the hormone produced when humans or mice make milk, binds to beta cells and triggers a signaling cascade that results in serotonin production, which then spurs beta cell proliferation and insulin production. In addition, the researchers found that serotonin in lactating mice acts as an antioxidant, helping keep beta cells healthy.

upping production
Lactation stimulates cells in the pituitary gland to produce the hormone prolactin 1, which, in mice, binds to beta cells in the pancreas 2. This leads to a signaling cascade that increases the cell’s production of serotonin 3. Serotonin binds to a separate receptor on the beta cells, stimulating them to proliferate and produce more insulin 4, and also serves as an antioxidant that protects cells from free radicals. Researchers propose that these mechanisms explain why women who breastfeed their children have reduced long-term risk of developing type 2 diabetes. Credit: Kelly Finan

Read the original post

Outbreak
Outbreak Daily Digest

podcasts GLP Podcasts More...
Biotech Facts & Fallacies
Talking Biotech
Genetics Unzipped

video Videos More...
stat hospitalai ink st x mod x

Meet STACI: STAT’s fascinating interactive guide to AI in healthcare

The Covid-19 pandemic underscores the importance of the technology in medicine: In the last few months, hospitals have used AI ...

bees and pollinators Bees & Pollinators More...
mag insects image superjumbo v

Disaster interrupted: Which farming system better preserves insect populations: Organic or conventional?

A three-year run of fragmentary Armageddon-like studies had primed the journalism pumps and settled the media framing about the future ...
dead bee desolate city

Are we facing an ‘Insect Apocalypse’ caused by ‘intensive, industrial’ farming and agricultural chemicals? The media say yes; Science says ‘no’

The media call it the “Insect Apocalypse”. In the past three years, the phrase has become an accepted truth of ...

infographics Infographics More...
breastfeeding bed x facebook x

Infographic: We know breastfeeding helps children. Now we know it helps mothers too

When a woman becomes pregnant, her risk of type 2 diabetes increases for the rest of her life, perhaps because ...

GMO FAQs GMO FAQs More...
biotechnology worker x

Can GMOs rescue threatened plants and crops?

Some scientists and ecologists argue that humans are in the midst of an "extinction crisis" — the sixth wave of ...
food globe x

Are GMOs necessary to feed the world?

Experts estimate that agricultural production needs to roughly double in the coming decades. How can that be achieved? ...
eating gmo corn on the cob x

Are GMOs safe?

In 2015, 15 scientists and activists issued a statement, "No Scientific consensus on GMO safety," in the journal Environmental Sciences ...
glp profiles GLP Profiles More...
Screen Shot at PM

Charles Benbrook: Agricultural economist and consultant for the organic industry and anti-biotechnology advocacy groups

Independent scientists rip Benbrook's co-authored commentary in New England Journal calling for reassessment of dangers of all GMO crops and herbicides ...
Screen Shot at PM

ETC Group: ‘Extreme’ biotechnology critic campaigns against synthetic biology and other forms of ‘extreme genetic engineering’

The ETC Group is an international environmental non-governmental organization (NGO) based in Canada whose stated purpose is to monitor "the impact of emerging technologies and ...
report this ad report this ad report this ad

Trending

News on human & agricultural genetics and biotechnology delivered to your inbox.
Optional. Mail on special occasions.
Send this to a friend