Blood sugar levels have to be within certain limits for human life. But we cannot, of course, calculate this delicate balance while eating sugary foods in our daily lives. Yet this calculation is performed “on our behalf” by our bodies with a most sensitive balance. Pancreatic cells, with no eyes, brain or hands and too small to be seen with the naked eye, monitor the level of sugar molecules inside a fluid in a flawless way and as a blessing from Allah.
Carbohydrates begin being digested in the mouth, being met by enzymes in saliva that break down carbohydrate. The digestion of the partially broken down molecules ends in the small intestine. The glucose molecules that emerge as a result of that digestion causes blood pressure to rise. But blood pressure is kept in balance by enzymes that intervene in glucose molecules. In short, one essential molecule for the body is kept in balance, by another molecule created by the will of Almighty Allah.
In the event of excess glucose in the body, these molecules are converted by means of an enzyme into another form known as “glycogen,” and stored. The enzyme involved in the conversion of glucose to glycogen is known as “glyconase.” This enzyme is manufactured by the liver, and that manufacture is under the control of a hormone secreted by the pancreas and known as “insulin.” The glycogen produced goes into action when the body needs energy and assumes a form ready to be used.
How Is Excess Sugar Balanced in the Body?
Pancreas cells find a sugar molecule from among all the millions of molecules in our blood and distinguishes it from them. What is more, they decide whether there are too few or too many of these molecules. They literally count the sugar molecules. The manner in which cells with no eyes, brain or hands and that are too small to be seen with the invisible eye can form an idea about sugar molecules is worthy of some reflection.
If the pancreas cells determine that there is more sugar in the blood than there should be, they decide to store that sugar. But they do not do that storing themselves. They have it done by other cells a long way away from them.
These far-off cells do not store sugar until a command comes telling them to do so but the pancreas cells send them a hormone carrying the instruction “start storing sugar.” The formula for this hormone, known as "insulin," is recorded in the DNA of the pancreas cells since the moment they come into being.
Special enzymes (worker proteins) in the pancreas cells read this formula and manufacture insulin accordingly. Hundreds of enzymes, all with different functions, work on this production.
The insulin hormone produced is sent to the target cells through the blood, the safest and fastest transportation network.
The other cells that read this “store sugar” command written in the hormone insulin and obey it without question. Gates are opened to allow sugar molecules to enter the cells.
But these gates do not open at random. The storage cells distinguish sugar cells alone from all the hundreds of different molecules in the blood, trap them and imprison them inside themselves.
Cells never disobey the instructions that reach them, they never misunderstand it, trap the wrong substances or try and store more sugar than necessary. They work with great discipline and self-sacrifice.
So when you drink too-sweet tea, this extraordinary system goes into operation and stores the excess sugar in your body. If that system did not work, the level of sugar in your blood would rise quickly and you would enter a coma and die. This system is so flawless that it can also work in the opposite way when necessary. If the level of sugar in the blood falls below normal, then this time the pancreas cells manufacture a very different hormone, “glucagon.” Glucagon carries an instruction to the cells storing sugar to “release sugar into the blood.” The cells obey that command as well, and release the sugar they are storing.
How is it that cells with no brain, nervous system, eyes or ears are able to perform such flawless calculations and activities? How is it that unconscious entities made up of combinations of proteins and fat molecules can do things too hard even for human beings to do? What is the source of this great consciousness exhibited by unconscious molecules? These phenomena of course show us the existence and might of Allah, Lord of all the universe and all living things.
What Happens When Sugar Enters Our Bodies?
A. Carbohydrates turn into glucose in the intestines and join the blood stream. If the level of glucose rises very high, the pancreas releases the hormone insulin that helps the cells absorb the glucose.
B. The hormone combines with a receptor that activates the glucose transporter. The glucose enters the cell and turns into energy. The level of glucose in the body remains stable. In diabetics, however, insulin fails to bind to the receptor and the transporter becomes inactive. The glucose remains in the blood system and blood sugar levels rise.
1. Glucose
2. Red blood cells
3. Normal blood vessel
4. Glucose is converted into energy
5. Active transporter
6. Insulin
7. Active transporter
8. A NORMAL HUMAN BEING
9. Carbohydrates, sugar, etc.
10. Breast glands
11. Stomach
12. Liver
13. Intestines
14. A DIABETIC
15. insulin
16. glucose
17. inactive receptor
18. inactive transporter
19. affected blood vessel
Glucose needs to be present at a level of 60% in the human body, in other words, 110 mg/dl, and 0.1 mg/dl in tissues. If something goes wrong with the system and insufficient glucose, the brain’s most important fuel, reaches the brain then this has very serious consequences. If the level of glucose reaching the brain falls below 0.04 mg/dl, the brain cells become oversensitive and send instructions to the body, causing the muscles in the body to constantly contract. Death takes place shortly after as a result.
How Does Diabetes Occur?
As described in brief above, carbohydrates turn into glucose in the intestines and enter the blood stream. If the level of glucose is very high, the pancreas cells release a hormone called insulin that helps cells absorb glucose. The hormone combines with a receptor that activates the glucose transporter. Glucose then enters the cell and turns into energy. In diabetics, however, if the pancreas does not perform this function then insulin cannot bind to its receptor and the transporter becomes inactive. The glucose remains in the blood stream, the level of sugar in the blood rises and the excess sugar in the blood is stored in the liver.
• 100 grams of blood collected after fasting contains 80 milligrams of sugar. After eating, that level rises to 140 mg in 1-2 hours.
• The level of sugar in the blood is determined as follows depending on the level of the disease.
• 1-2 hours after eating, blood sugar levels are;
• 80 mg - 140 mg in normal people.
• Moderate: 130 mg 0 190 mg.
• Severe: 160 mg - 215 mg.
• You can now perform an experiment, if you like. Give yourself an instruction and tell the cells in your body, especially those in the liver, to “take back the sugar in my blood” and wait for them to listen to you and start storing sugar!
No such thing will happen. You will be unaware of the pancreas, insulin and the liver in your daily life, let alone be able to control them. You will be unaware that your blood sugar level has risen. Even if two bottles with different levels of sugar in them were put in front of you, you still could not tell the difference; you would need a laboratory and advanced equipment to do that. But some of your cells that you have never seen measure the level of sugar in your blood more sensitively than that laboratory and equipment and decided what needs to be done. They then take the appropriate steps. The cells recognize the sugar in the blood, distinguish them and trap them. Instead of someone entering a sugar coma and dying after eating a cake, he remains alive, by Allah’s leave, thanks to this wonderful system.
The Human Body Has Been Equipped with Flawless Characteristics Ever Since the Creation of the First Human Being, Adam (pbuh)
The flawless system in the human body works just like a factory and, unless Allah chooses otherwise, it never makes a mistake. Every cell and every molecule knows its job and performs it to perfection. Everything, from the amino acids that represent the building blocks of life, to atoms, and from molecules to proteins has submitted to the might of Allah. Neither the molecules within a cell nor the other structures that act alongside it have any intelligence, knowledge, skills or education. There is no need to wait for a certain amount of time for this whole system and production to develop: We are born with this perfect system, which was created then the same as we have it now. Allah has flawlessly created this division of labor that has been operating for thousands of years, long before science was ever aware of it. And every molecule in every human being has always done its work in a perfect manner. This sublime creative artistry of Allah is revealed as follows in the Qur’an:
“We created man from the purest kind of clay; then made him a drop in a secure receptacle; then formed the drop into a clot and formed the clot into a lump and formed the lump into bones and clothed the bones in flesh; and then brought him into being as another creature. Blessed be Allah, the Best of Creators!” (Surat al-Mu’minun, 12-14)
