Our research projects

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.

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.

Losing weight and going into remission can be a huge challenge for people living with type 2 diabetes, and isn’t possible for everyone. Dr William Scott wants to figure out exactly what goes on in fat tissue during weight loss, and how and why this can help people go into remission. A deeper understanding of this could help scientists to develop first-of-a-kind treatments for type 2 diabetes that aim to directly trigger remission.

When fat cells are inflamed by high blood sugar levels in people with type 2 diabetes, they can release toxic levels of fatty acids into the blood, leading to insulin resistance. But cells in the body need a healthy level of fatty acids to work, so removing them completely isn’t an option. Professor Robin Klemm wants to understand more about how fatty acids are produced, which could help researchers to develop new treatments to control the level of fatty acids better and reduce insulin resistance.

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.

Gestational diabetes affects pregnant women and can cause complications throughout pregnancy and birth. It’s linked to mothers being overweight or obese, and can increase the risk of developing type 2 diabetes later in life for both the mother and child.

Dr Claire Meek believes that reducing calories during pregnancy could improve the management of gestational diabetes, delivery of the baby and reduce the risk of type 2 diabetes in the future. 

Insulin-making beta cells have recycling centres, called lysosomes, which help to break down waste inside our cells. When someone has type 2 diabetes, this process stops working properly. Dr Aida Martinez-Sanchez wants to investigate why this happens by studying the role a protein called M6PR, plays in controlling how lysosomes in beta cells behave. Understanding this could help researchers to develop better treatments for type 2 diabetes and improve those already available.