Grant: Operating Grant: Impact Grant : CEEHRC Phase II

Gestational diabetes is a condition diagnosed between the 24th and 28th weeks of pregnancy. It originates from a problem in glucose transport into cells. This condition affects up to 26% of pregnancies and is known to increase the risk of complications. Recent data shows an increase of gestational diabetes cases over the last 20 years. This condition is now considered a real public health concern. Unfortunately, the tools we use only enable us to diagnose and treat elevated blood glucose once it is present and thus only after it has started to affect the health of the mother and her baby. Accordingly, the World Health Organization (WHO) strongly recommends that gestational diabetes should be detected and treated earlier. In that context, microRNAs can play a big role and unlock many possibilities. MicroRNAs are small genetic sequences that regulate numerous aspects of our biology and that can travel from one organ to another in the human body. They could thus reveal early losses of biologic equilibrium such as those that occur before gestational diabetes develops. Recent studies have revealed their enormous potential as markers to monitor the development or progression of diseases including diabetes. Our pilot data strongly suggests that this also applies to gestational diabetes and supports new promising possibilities to develop innovative prediction panels based on miRNAs detectable in the first trimester of pregnancy. Based on our exciting preliminary findings, we thus propose to develop a miRNAs-based panel for prediction of gestational diabetes during pregnancy. Our project takes root from the most modern techniques available to seek microRNAs in maternal blood and aims at finding the best candidates for the prediction of gestational diabetes. These findings will later enable us to understand and intervene before the appearance of elevated blood glucose during pregnancy and its harmful health effects on the mother and her child.