Transporters may help delay diabetes-related retinal damage

Here is an update on some help to prevent blindness in diabetics - the leading cause of blindness in working age persons. Very interesting!

Article source: http://www.news-medical.net/?id=33061

Two transporters that deliver alternative energy sources to the eye may help delay retinal damage that can occur in diabetes, researchers say.

The transporters, SMCT1 and SMCT2, can circumvent the eye's protective blood-retinal barrier, delivering energy sources lactate and ketone bodies to a healthy eye, says Dr. Pamela Martin, biochemist at the Medical College of Georgia.

In diabetes, characterized by plenty of glucose but the inability of cells to use it, the retina may turn to those alternate sources for survival.

"Glucose is your primary energy source," says Dr. Martin. "But in diabetes, the retina undergoes a lot of stress, there is oxidative damage and a lot of other things going on. These transporters, we believe, may be instrumental in bringing in additional substrates which the cells can use for energy to try and prevent death."

Diabetic retinopathy, the leading cause of blindness in working-age adults, results in death of retinal neurons, at least in part because glucose availability is compromised for this high-energy-consuming tissue, says Dr.