Very low affinity insulin analogue

Insulin is a peptide hormone acting as a key regulator of glucose homeostasis. Insulin binds to the insulin receptor (InsR), which exists in two alternatively spliced isoforms, InsR-A and InsR-B. The insulin receptor belongs to the same family of receptor tyrosine kinases as the IGF1 receptor (IGF1R) and insulin is therefore also able to bind to the IGF1R albeit with considerably lower affinity as compared to the insulin receptor.

NNC0121-0038 is a very low affinity insulin analogue in which the phenylalanine in position 25 of the B-chain is mutated to aspartic acid causing NNC0121-0038 to bind the insulin receptor with ~2000-fold lower affinity than human insulin.