Science Spotlight: A new obesity target may avoid nausea, muscle loss

Embark Laboratories ApS and collaborators from two Novo Nordisk Foundation Centers showed in Nature that activation of the GPCR NK2R can suppress appetite without nausea, and increase energy expenditure without affecting lean mass, addressing two limitations of current obesity drugs. A third benefit was its ability to increase insulin sensitivity.

Analysis of data from the HugeAMP Type 2 Diabetes Knowledge Portal, which contains human genetic associations assembled from over 350 studies, identified an association between NK2R expression and hemoglobin A1c levels, a clinical indicator of glucose control and diabetes progression. ...