Naked mole-rats

OK, I hit the Naked mole-rats (NMRs). They're not pretty!

I would just like to point people towards Table 2, especially the lines Fasting glucose, GTT and insulin.

NMRs don't do insulin or, if they do, it is very different from ordinary rodent insulin. To the point where a normal rodent insulin assay simply can't find any insulin-like peptide in their blood.

Then there is Table 3 giving an HbA1c of 5.5%. Not suggestive of hypo or hyper glycaemia, with the normal caveats about HbA1c. BTW look at the HbA1c of normal lab mice. You too could be diabetic, just eat cr@pinabag.

NMRs also tend to fail GTTs:

"Surprisingly, NMRs even at a young age show impaired glucose tolerance (53), and insulin cannot be detected using rodent assays (Kang, Biney, and Buffenstein, unpublished data, 2004). We are currently assessing if this is because NMRs are naturally deficient in insulin or if their structure of insulin diverges to such an extent that it cannot be measured using common commercially available assays. Despite the apparent lack of insulin and abnormal glucose handling, glycated hemoglobin levels are low and similar in both 2- and 20-year-olds (Kang, Biney, and Buffenstein, unpublished data, 2004)."

Buffenstein has a bit to say on PUFA, DHA and D3 which are thought provoking.

I think it might be time to dig in to the pathological aspects of insulin sensitivity. We think of insulin sensitivity as a Good Thing. Well, maybe...

Peter