Faculty
Kinesiology
Supervisor Name
Dr. Jamie Melling
Keywords
Type 1 diabetes, estrogen, female, hypoglycemia, exercise, metabolism, lipid, glucose, liver
Description
Regular exercise has shown to benefit the health of individuals with type 1 diabetes mellitus (T1DM). However, a barrier to regular exercise for this population is the fear of low blood glucose (BG) levels, also known as hypoglycemia. Hypoglycemia can result in short and long-term side-effects, such as recurring loss of consciousness or in severe cases death.
In non-diabetics, sex-related differences in fuel selection during exercise are well established. Women shift towards using fats as fuel whereas men rely mostly on sugars (i.e., carbohydrates) for energy production. Exercise during the luteal phase of the female menstrual cycle, where estrogen levels are elevated, has shown to promote fat utilization.
For women with T1DM, exercise during elevated estrogen levels may potentially provide a protective mechanism against hypoglycemia as energy sources such as glycogen (i.e., stored sugar) may be preserved. This may reduce the need for the body to replete energy from the blood post-exercise, thereby keeping BG levels balanced. My summer project aimed to investigate this phenomenon.
Acknowledgements
I would like to give a huge thank you to Dr. Jamie Melling for his invaluable supervision and mentorship this summer. Additionally, I would also like to thank Silar Gardy for her guidance and tissue/sample preparation. Finally, thank you to fellow summer student Emma Wardhaugh for aiding me in performing western blot analysis.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
Document Type
Poster
Included in
Endocrine System Diseases Commons, Medical Biochemistry Commons, Medical Molecular Biology Commons, Medical Physiology Commons, Nutritional and Metabolic Diseases Commons
The Effects of Estrogen in the Glucoregulatory Response to Exercise in Type 1 Diabetes
Regular exercise has shown to benefit the health of individuals with type 1 diabetes mellitus (T1DM). However, a barrier to regular exercise for this population is the fear of low blood glucose (BG) levels, also known as hypoglycemia. Hypoglycemia can result in short and long-term side-effects, such as recurring loss of consciousness or in severe cases death.
In non-diabetics, sex-related differences in fuel selection during exercise are well established. Women shift towards using fats as fuel whereas men rely mostly on sugars (i.e., carbohydrates) for energy production. Exercise during the luteal phase of the female menstrual cycle, where estrogen levels are elevated, has shown to promote fat utilization.
For women with T1DM, exercise during elevated estrogen levels may potentially provide a protective mechanism against hypoglycemia as energy sources such as glycogen (i.e., stored sugar) may be preserved. This may reduce the need for the body to replete energy from the blood post-exercise, thereby keeping BG levels balanced. My summer project aimed to investigate this phenomenon.