Our research projects

In diabetes, insulin-making beta cells in pancreas have either been destroyed or don’t work properly. Dr Liu is researching a molecule called miR-33 to see if blocking it could help beta cells to work better. This could lead to new treatments for type 2 diabetes and improvement transplants of beta cells for people living with type 1.

Gestational diabetes develops during pregnancy. People can experience high levels of stigma linked to the condition, which can have a negative effect on their mental and physical health. Dr Rita Forde and Prof Angus Forbes will work with women who have experience of gestational diabetes and healthcare professionals. Together, they'll develop communication tools that aim raise awareness of and combat gestational diabetes- related stigma. 

Lower levels of vitamin C have been linked with obesity and an increased risk of developing type 2 diabetes. Professor Jon Whitehead will explore how vitamin C gets into fats cells and if more vitamin C inside these cells helps insulin to work better. Understanding this could help us find out if vitamin C supplements could become a new strategy to help treat type 2 diabetes in the future.

Disruptions to our body clock can have a surprising impact on our health, including links with eye damage for people living with diabetes. Dr Eleni Beli wants to take a closer look at these links, to understand more about how eye damage can develop and progress. Her research could uncover an innovative new approach to help people with diabetes avoid sight loss.

Eighty per cent of people living with diabetes take medications to treat their condition. Professor Helen Colhoun will look at the health records of everyone with diabetes in Scotland to learn more about the effectiveness and safety of different diabetes medications when they’re used in the real word. This could pick up any missed safety concerns or benefits that weren’t spotted in clinical trials and transform how diabetes drugs are prescribed. In doing so, this could reduce the number of people living with diabetes who experience harmful side effects, making their care safer and more personalised. 

Women living with type 1 diabetes and their babies can be at a higher risk of difficulties during pregnancy and birth. Professor Claire Meek wants to see whether levels of a molecule found in the blood can help to predict a high-risk pregnancy. Being able to spot potential problems in advance could help women with type 1 and their babies to get the tailored care they need to avoid these problems.

The brain has an important role in measuring and controlling blood sugar levels. In people with diabetes this can go wrong when the brain chooses a level that’s too high. Dr Clemence Blouet wants to find out if there’s a way of developing new treatments that can reprogramme the brain to keep blood sugar at safer levels.

There are a number of inherited genetic conditions causing very low body fat stores. One of these is congenital generalised lipodystrophy type 2 which can also lead to type 2 diabetes. Dr McIlroy’s shown that gene therapy can treat this condition so he’s now going to study it in more detail. He’s hoping this knowledge will lead to better treatments for type 2 diabetes. 

The use of antipsychotics in children has increased dramatically in recent decades. In adults, these drugs are linked with a greater risk of developing type 2 diabetes. But we don’t know how they affect type 2 risk in children and young people. Dr Lau will study NHS medical records from those treated with antipsychotics and will search for risk factors of type 2 in this group. This could give us better ways to help prevent type 2 diabetes in children who take antipsychotics.

There’s evidence that common viral infections in children may play a part in triggering the immune system attack at the root of type 1 diabetes. But we don’t yet understand how or why only some children are affected. Dr Kasra Bahadori will study children’s immune responses to uncover missing pieces of the puzzle, with the aim of developing treatments that could prevent viruses from triggering type 1 diabetes.