Animal Models of Diabetes Frontiers in Research PDF

Preface

The present edition of Animal Models of Diabetes , first issued in 2001, is motivated by the wide-ranging expansion and intensity of diabetes research comprising numerous diabetic animals. This is a welcome response to the rise in global awareness of the increasing incidence of diabetes. The gain in experience and new information on existing and new animals with diabetes required an update and a review of the accrued data to promote new avenues of investigation.

The new observations in this volume are contributed by prominent experts in the field. The accumulation of scattered data and their lucid presentation will promote understanding of the etiopathology of diabetes and offers a new grasp of insulin action, its negative feedback leading to insulin resistance, and its detrimental outcomes. There is also new knowledge on specific complications of diabetes offering an incentive to test advanced modalities to prevent and inhibit their occurrence.

This edition contains new and updated, well-referenced reviews on rodent diabetes, pigs in diabetes research, nutritionally induced diabetes in the gerbil Psammomys obesus , Cohen rats, and animals with induced obesity. It also offers interesting observations on retinopathy in spontaneous diabetes resembling human lesions.

There is no need to underscore the enormous contribution of diabetes research in animals to the understanding of various aspects of human diabetes. Although none of the animals fully represents the human syndrome, the various mechanisms and complications in animals are worth testing because human diabetes also shows many variations. This knowledge will help in the elucidation of general pathogenesis of this disease and clarify the processes of development of diabetic lesions and complications.