Development of Liver-Targeting Insulin
Abstract
In a healthy individual, insulin is first delivered to liver, which takes ~50% of all insulin before the rest was delivered to other parts of body. In current insulin therapy for diabetics, more insulin action happens in places such as fat and muscle cells relative to liver cells. This outcome is known to be associated with atherosclerosis, cancer, hypoglycemia, and other adverse metabolic effects. To overcome this limitation, we proposed to develop new liver-targeting insulin therapies such that more insulin could be delivered to liver in order to mimic the healthy conditions. Using chemical synthesis and bioconjugation techniques, we synthesized new insulin molecules with ligands specific to liver cells. These insulin molecules can activate human insulin signaling in cell models and therefore, retain their bioactivity. We further demonstrated that these insulin molecules when injected to mice led to higher accumulation in liver compared to native insulin control. Efforts to investigate the in vivo effects of these insulin molecules are currently underway.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Aug 01, 2017
- Accession Number
- AD1050205
Entities
People
- Danny Chou
Organizations
- University of Utah