Newly diagnosed Type 2 diabetes tend to have one thing in common: obesity. Exactly how diet and obesity trigger diabetes has long been the subject of intense scientific research.

High levels of fat shut down a key enzyme that promotes glucose sensing in pancreatic beta cells — revealing a pathway implicated in the Type 2 diabetes epidemic

A new study led by Jamey D. Marth, director of the Center for Nanomedicine, a collaboration between UC Santa Barbara and Sanford-Burnham Medical Research Institute (Sanford-Burnham), has revealed a pathway that links high-fat diets to a sequence of molecular events responsible for the onset and severity of diabetes. These findings were published online August 14 in the journal Nature Medicine.