Coping with diabetes requires frequent invasive blood glucose-based monitoring. Partly for this reason, and also because of the associated reduced skin wound healing and consequent increased risk of infection, non-invasive glucose monitoring technologies are needed. We report here that in both an in vivo preclinical type I diabetes model and healthy controls, skin keratinocytes react notably to high blood glucose with induced Trisk 95 protein and gene expression. Importantly, this response is independent of the presence or absence of insulin. This glucose-induced Trisk 95 expression increases intracellular calcium and concurrently compromises mitochondrial properties, which can be rescued by Trisk 95 knockout. 
Thus skin cells may provide a novel way of measuring blood glucose by monitoring Trisk 95 expression. This would serve as an insulin-independent glucose-responsive biomarker for use in personalised, vital and real-time blood glucose biosensor applications.

NAT19 is novel biomarker for sensing glucose in healthy and type I diabetic skin