On December 20, 2017, the research of Prof. Liu Liegang’s group was published in Diabetes Care.

The paper, which first authored by PH.D candidate Sun Taoping and corresponding authored by Prof. Liu Liegang(HUST) and Prof. Frank B.Hu(Havard University), is titled as “Plasma Alkylresorcinol Metabolite, a Biomarker of Whole-Grain Wheat and Rye Intake, and Risk of Type 2 Diabetes and Impaired Glucose Regulation in a Chinese Population”.

It’s recorded that this is the third paper of the group published in Diabetes Care and the former two are all ESI high cited.

Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus, also known as non-insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus, often occurs after 35-40 years of age and 90% of patients with diabetes suffer from it. Type 2 diabetes is a risk factor for a variety of cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases. The complications can possibly lead to disability and death. China has the largest population with diabetes in the world, and the number is still increasing. Diabetes has become a major public health issue which do harm to to the health of Chinese residents seriously.

As a regulatory factor, diet has great significance in the prevention and treatment of type 2 diabetes. Numerous epidemiological studies and evidence of evidence-based medical care show that increasing intakes of whole-grain foods reduces the risk of type 2 diabetes. In the reported epidemiological studies, dietary surveys are usually used to assess individual food intake, however, traditional dietary surveys can not accurately estimate food intake because of systematic errors and retrospective errors. The different definitions and complex composition of whole-grain foods bring even more limitations. Alkyl resorcinol is present as a phenolic substance, which is in large quantities in the outer bran of wheat and rye, but can hardly be found in cereal and refined cereal. Alkyl resorcinol is thermally stable during food processing and about 60% of it is absorbed by the small intestine. It has an in vivo half-life of about 5 hours and its metabolite DHPPA is more stable with an in vivo half-life of 16.3 hours. Based on the above characteristics, DHPPA, an alkylresorcinol metabolite, can be used as a new biomarker to assess individual whole-grain intake in a more stable and objective way.

Under the guidance of Professor Liu Liegang, doctoral student Sun Taoping established a set of LC-MS / MS method with high sensitivity , high throughput (analysis time 10min) and portable pretreatment. It has detected and analyzed more than 3000 plasma DHPPA Data from a case-control study. It was the first time to observe the whole-grain dietary fiber biomarkers DHPPA in the plasma with a conclusion that type 2 diabetes and the risk of impaired glucose regulation is negatively correlated. The study not only provides data support for both whole-grain food intake and type 2 diabetes at a deeper level, but also reveals that in addition to traditional dietary surveys, more objective dietary biomarkers can be applied to study the relationship between diet and diabetes, which provides a new way of thinking and research for provides nutrition epidemiology. provides nutrition epidemiology.