LAUSR

What is the topic of this review? The Zucker Diabetic‐Sprague Dawley (ZDSD) rat is in the early adoption phase of use by researchers in the fields of diabetes, including prediabetes, obesity and metabolic syndrome. It is essential that physiology researchers choose preclinical models that model human type 2 diabetes appropriately and are aware of the limitations on experimental design. What advances does it highlight? Our review of the scientific literature finds that although sex, age and diets contribute to variability, the ZDSD phenotype and disease progression model the characteristics of humans who have prediabetes and diabetes, including co‐morbidities.