Grant: Project Grant

Diabetes occurs when the insulin-producing pancreatic ß-cells die or stop functioning resulting in uncontrolled blood sugar levels. Current treatments for diabetes include replacing the function of these cells either through insulin injection or the use of oral drugs that help control blood sugar levels. However, often these therapies fail, resulting in extended periods of high blood sugar levels that can be damaging to nerves, eyes, and organs. Alternatives to injectable and oral therapies, including improving the function of insulin-producing cells or transplanting replacement insulin-producing cells, have been shown to reduce the damage caused by high glucose. Unfortunately, not enough is known about how normal ß-cells work and not enough transplantable donor tissue is available to treat the increasing number of people with diabetes. Currently, we are able to form cells that resemble ß-cells from stem cells but in order to improve the efficiency of this process we will need to better understand human pancreas development. In addition, we are unsure whether these stem cell-derived ß-cells will function normally after transplantation into those with diabetes or if they will return to being stem cells. In this project we aim to study how the cell cycle, the process where a cell grows and divides to produce copies of itself, controls human ß-cell formation. This study will be the first to investigate the role of the cell cycle during human pancreas development and will improve our understanding of how human ß-cells are formed and are maintained. This knowledge could lead to new approaches to generate treatments for the over 10 million Canadians that are living with diabetes or prediabetes.