AbstractsBiology & Animal Science

Diabetes is a chronic disease, which over 300 million people are living with. From 1996 to 2012, the number of people with diabetes in Denmark has increased about 2.8 times. Studies have shown that miR-29 is up-regulated in β-cells that are stimulated by a high concentration of glucose. Studies also showed that when miR-29 is over-expressed in β-cells, the insulin secretion seems to be lower compared to normal β-cells. In the report we examined the insulin secretion in cells at a 3 mM and a 20 mM glucose concentration, to examine how the cells were affected by an over-expression of miR-29. We also examined the effect of miR-29 on proliferation of the cells in a 3 mM and a 20 mM glucose concentration. The cells were stimulated with specific glucose concentrations in the Glucose Stimulated Insulin Secretion (GSIS). For the insulin concentration an ELISA test was conducted, and an iCELLigence for the cell proliferation. The results showed that the insulin secretion decreased in cells with an over-expression of miR-29, for half of our samples this decrease was insignificant, making the results inconclusive. Only two out of six control samples and two out of six miR-29 samples showed that 20 mM glucose stimulated a higher insulin secretion than 3 mM glucose. The inconsistencies in our insulin secretion make the results unreliable. The results from the iCELLigence indicate that the over-expression of miR-29 might affect the growth pattern, but not the growth rate. The doubling time for the control cells and the miR-29 cells are almost identical, but the proliferation during the cell cycle might happen in different phases.