Post #20140 by Humuhumu on Fri, Jan 17, 2003 9:10 PM

Very cool! I mean, it's not cool you're type 1, that overall kinda sucks, but cool you're there. I dunno what I'm talking about.

Anyway, Mr. Humuhumu is Type 1 (diagnosed 20+ years ago, when he was 16). Mr. Humuhumu actually doesn't limit his diet much -- he indulges in sweets just as much as I do, he just takes insulin for it. For normal (non-alcohol) drinking, he avoids juice and opts for diet options, but he doesn't do that when having cocktails -- he takes insulin if neccessary, and anyway, most of the time he's eating also. Have you tried V8 diet splash? It's hard to find, but it's as close as you can come to juice without carbohydrates.

Another connection (which is actually totally coincidental) is that I'm doing Type 1 diabetes research -- I'm leading a team of people doing integration of data generated by many different type 1 research centers around the world to do systems biology research -- instead of doing research on one gene or protein at a time, we look at how the whole system of genes, rna, proteins, etc., learning how they work as a network, with the intention of learning what in the system has gone wrong for a diabetic.

Right now, we're focusing mainly on genotyping data (genotyping is where samples from affected individuals are tested for specific polymorphisms [polymorphisms are alterations in the genetic code -- everyone's code has bases that differ here and there, about once every 1,000 bases] and since these polymorphisms are inherited, we can link particular polymorphisms with inherited diseases, which can help us 1. identify regions of the genome which likely contain genes or that, when altered, make the individual more likely to inherit the disease, and 2. identify those individuals who are more likely to inherit a disease, so that we can target them for treatment) and microarray (gene expression) data (a microarray is a small glass chip which has up to 40,000 individual small chains of gene sequence printed into an array, each one representing a different gene [in actuality, genes are replicated on the chip for quality control -- usually there's about 10-15K different genes on a human chip] -- when two samples [for simplicity's sake, we'll say a blood sample] that have been specially labeled which a dye tag that lights up when excited with a particular laser are smeared over the chip, we can tell what genes were actively being expressed (and somewhat by extention, what proteins were present in the sytem) at a higher or lower rate in one sample vs. another. For instance, if you could look at samples taken from a diabetic as their diabetes was first developing, you could see what genes were being activated or deactivated, giving you a key to understanding what the true mechanism is. We'll also be branching out to include proteomic data (kinda like microarray data, but it looks at the quantity of proteins being expressed, a step closer to reality than microarray data), and more traditional cell biology data.

I know that's totally not what you were asking about, but I think it's just so damned cool. It's not going to help diabetes much over the next 10 years, but it could hopefully help us come up with some personalized treatments, or even possibly preventions, over the next 20 years. But I'm also keeping up with all of the more advanced research that's happening -- there's fascinating work happening with gene therapy and bioartificial pancreases, and of course the transplant work is fantastic, even if it's not going to be the ultimate answer to the problem.

So! Are you on the pump? Have you looked at the new wrist-watch lookin' continual sugar-checker? Have you tried the new glargine?