Date of Completion
2023
Document Type
Honors College Thesis
Department
Larner College of Medicine
Thesis Type
Honors College, College of Arts and Science Honors
First Advisor
Tom Jetton
Second Advisor
Giuseppe Petrucci
Third Advisor
Leon Lifschutz
Keywords
Diabetes, a7R agonists, Pancreatic b-cells, Treatment for Type 1 Diabetes, GTS-21
Abstract
Diabetes involves the loss of functional pancreatic ß-cells, the source of insulin production in the body. Many treatments for diabetes exist including multiple forms of insulin injection, metformin, biguanides, gut hormone analogs, etc. However, all of these treat diabetic symptoms but do not directly affect ß-cells, and often have detrimental side effects making them undesirable long term treatments. This thesis will focus on identifying primarily GTS-21 as an a7-nicotinic acetylcholine receptor (a7R) agonist in an in vitro screening assay to look for its effectiveness in restoring ß-cell function and survival through stimulating the anti-inflammatory pathway via a7R activation. The culmination of this work will characterize the potential of this human safe a7R agonist as a means for future in vivo testing and eventual use as a novel diabetes treatments.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.
Recommended Citation
Fitzpatrick, Ryan and Jetton, Tom, "Exploring Human Safe Compounds for Treatment in Type 1 Diabetes" (2023). UVM Honors College Senior Theses. 544.
https://scholarworks.uvm.edu/hcoltheses/544