Insulin Regulates Brain Function, but How Does It Get There?

We have learned over the last several decades that the brain is an important target for insulin action. Insulin in the central nervous system (CNS) affects feeding behavior and body energy stores, the metabolism of glucose and fats in the liver and adipose, and various aspects of memory and cognition. Insulin may even influence the development or progression of Alzheimer disease. Yet, a number of seemingly simple questions (e.g., What is the pathway for delivery of insulin to the brain? Is insulin’s delivery to the brain mediated by the insulin receptor and is it a regulated process? Is brain insulin delivery affected by insulin resistance?) are unanswered. Here we briefly review accumulated findings affirming the importance of insulin as a CNS regulatory peptide, examine the current understanding of how peripheral insulin is delivered to the brain, and identify key gaps in the current understanding of this process.

• Publication year

  2014

• Venue

  Diabetes

• Publication date

  2014-11-13

• Fields of study

  Biology, Medicine

• Identifiers
  DOI 10.2337/db14-0340PMID 25414013PMCID 4237995
• External record

  Open on Semantic Scholar

• Source metadata

  Semantic Scholar, PubMed

• No claims are published for this paper.

• No concepts are published for this paper.

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