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Date: | Mon, 29 Dec 1997 09:53:05 -0800 |
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as we have been discussing blood sugar and related topics, and I came
across the material below last night, I thought I would share it with
the list in case others found it of interest.
Regards,
Tom Billings
[log in to unmask]
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Miller JC; Colagiuri S.
The carnivore connection: dietary carbohydrate in the evolution of NIDDM.
Diabetologia, 1994 Dec, 37(12):1280-6.
(UI: 95203542)
Abstract: We postulate a critical role for the quantity and quality of dietary
carbohydrate in the pathogenesis of non-insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus
(NIDDM). Our primate ancestors ate a high-carbohydrate diet and the brain
and reproductive tissues evolved a specific requirement for glucose as a
source of fuel. But the Ice Ages which dominated the last two million years
of human evolution brought a low-carbohydrate, high-protein diet. Certain
metabolic adaptations were therefore necessary to accommodate the low
glucose intake. Studies in both humans and experimental animals indicate
that the adaptive (phenotypic) response to low-carbohydrate intake is
insulin resistance. This provides the clue that insulin resistance is the
mechanism for coping with a shortage of dietary glucose. We propose that the
low-carbohydrate carnivorous diet would have disadvantaged reproduction in
insulin-sensitive individuals and positively selected for individuals with
insulin resistance. Natural selection would therefore result in a high
proportion of people with genetically-determined insulin resistance. Other
factors, such as geographic isolation, have contributed to further increases
in the prevalence of the genotype in some population groups. Europeans may
have a low incidence of diabetes because they were among the first to adopt
agriculture and their diet has been high in carbohydrate for 10,000 years.
The selection pressure for insulin resistance (i.e., a low-carbohydrate
diet) was therefore relaxed much sooner in Caucasians than in other
populations. Hence the prevalence of genes producing insulin resistance
should be lower in the European population and any other group exposed to
high-carbohydrate intake for a sufficiently long period of time.
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