Our research projects

We know that a person’s genetic makeup is important in type 2 diabetes but we don’t know exactly how they’re linked. Dr Jennings is going to study genes related to beta cell and pancreas development and the 3D switches that control them. This will give us a better understanding of why type 2 diabetes develops, which could lead to new therapies to prevent and treat it. 

People with type 2 diabetes are more likely to develop depression. This could in part be down to our genes. Professor Prokopenko plans to study changes in the GLP-1R gene and look at if and how the gene could increase the risk of both type 2 diabetes and depression. If the shared genes affect the development of both conditions it could lead to improved medications that work to treat both conditions. 

Maturity Onset Diabetes in the Young (MODY) is a rare type of diabetes caused by a change in a single gene. Researchers are still finding other changes in the genes linked to MODY, but we don’t yet know if these new changes are harmless, or also cause MODY. Professor Guy Rutter wants to confirm whether these newly found genetic changes cause MODY, how they cause it, and what the best treatment is for people with these particular genetic changes.

Immunotherapies work by retraining the immune system, and scientists hope they could stop or prevent the immune attack behind Type 1 diabetes. They’re testing different immunotherapies right now, but we need to speed up progress. Professor Colin Dayan will expand a network of immunotherapy research teams and improve the clinical trials process to help make these treatments available for people with Type 1 as soon as possible.

Having diabetes can lead to damaged blood vessels in the retina at the back of the eye, caused by high blood sugar levels. This can lead to vision problems and sight loss. Dr Judith Lechner wants to find out if a protective protein can be used to repair and reduce this damage, and potentially be used as a new treatment option in the future.

As type 2 diabetes develops, alpha cells in the pancreas fail. Professor Hodson has found that a protein called GC plays a key role in how alpha cells function. He will run experiments to figure out how the loss of GC impacts why alpha cells go wrong in type 2 diabetes. In the future, this could lead to new treatments for type 2 diabetes that help to keep alpha cells working and give people better blood sugar control. 

People with diabetes are at a higher risk of developing heart problems. Professor Madeddu plans to develop a new treatment, called a protein therapy, which will deliver a protein, that’s been found to help protect heart health. He’ll find out if the therapy can help cells to make more of this ‘longevity’ protein, to help prevent heart problems. This could lead to new treatments that protect people with diabetes from potentially life-threatening complications.

For people with diabetes, wounds such as foot ulcers can take a long time to heal. We urgently need to understand why this happens. Dr Gurevich plans to find the proteins involved in wound healing in zebrafish that have diabetes and then use genetic ‘scissors’ technology to confirm his findings. Ultimately, this may lead to new treatments for people with diabetes that help their wounds repair more quickly.