title: Bats: Body mass index, forearm mass index, blood glucose levels and SLC2A2 genes for diabetes.
abstract: Bats have an unusually large volume of endocrine tissue, with a large population of beta cells, and an elevated sensitivity to glucose and insulin. This makes them excellent animal models for studying diabetes mellitus. We evaluated bats as models for diabetes in terms of lifestyle and genetic factors. For lifestyle factors, we generated data sets of 149 body mass index (BMI) and 860 forearm mass index (FMI) measurements for different species of bats. Both showed negative inter-species correlations with blood glucose levels in sixteen bats examined. The negative inter-species correlations may reflect adaptation of a small insectivorous ancestor to a larger frugivore. We identified an 11 bp deletion in the proximal promoter of SLC2A2 that we predicted would disrupt binding sites for the transcription repressor ZNF354C. In frugivorous bats this could explain the relatively high expression of this gene, resulting in a better capacity to absorb glucose and decrease blood glucose levels.
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Estuarine and Coastal Research, East China Normal University, Shanghai 200062, China.
authors.forename: Fanxing
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Meng
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Estuarine and Coastal Research, East China Normal University, Shanghai 200062, China.|Kunming Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences &University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming 650223, China.
authors.forename: Lei
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Zhu
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Estuarine and Coastal Research, East China Normal University, Shanghai 200062, China.
authors.forename: Wenjie
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Huang
authors.affiliation: Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathobiology, University of Toronto, Toronto M5S 2E8, Canada.
authors.forename: David M
authors.initials: DM
authors.lastname: Irwin
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Estuarine and Coastal Research, East China Normal University, Shanghai 200062, China.|Key Laboratory of Zoonosis of Liaoning Province, College of Animal Science and Veterinary Medicine, Shenyang Agricultural University, Shenyang 110866, China.
authors.forename: Shuyi
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Zhang
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001483:Base Sequence; D001665:Binding Sites; D001786:Blood Glucose / Q000378:metabolism; D015992:Body Mass Index; D002685:Chiroptera / Q000097:blood* / Q000235:genetics*; D003920:Diabetes Mellitus / Q000097:blood* / Q000235:genetics*; D019143:Evolution, Molecular; D005247:Feeding Behavior; D005552:Forelimb / Q000033:anatomy & histology*; D005638:Fruit; D005951:Glucose Tolerance Test; D051273:Glucose Transporter Type 2 / Q000235:genetics*; D006801:Humans; D007313:Insecta; D016013:Likelihood Functions; D009929:Organ Size; D010802:Phylogeny; D020641:Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide / Q000235:genetics; D011401:Promoter Regions, Genetic / Q000235:genetics; D060888:Real-Time Polymerase Chain Reaction; D014157:Transcription Factors / Q000378:metabolism
chemical_list: D001786:Blood Glucose; D051273:Glucose Transporter Type 2; D014157:Transcription Factors