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Our researchers are working on different ways to develop a cure for type 1 diabetes - from growing insulin-producing beta cells in labs to hacking the immune system.
Learn about the technologies that can deliver insulin automatically when needed. And discover the next generation of insulins that are currently being developed.
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The announcement is the biggest treatment breakthrough for type 1 diabetes since the discovery of insulin.
This World Diabetes Day, we’re inviting you to celebrate by wearing your most joyful, whimsical and downright wonderful outfits.
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Take our free course for schools to learn more about supporting pupils with type 1 diabetes in educational settings.
JDRF has now rebranded to Breakthrough T1D. Our name has changed, our mission has not.
Home > About Breakthrough T1D UK & our impact > Our research > Current research projects
Connect Immune Research has launched a first-of-its-kind research project to confront the UK’s high prevalence of autoimmune conditions.
Professor Alexander Miras is investigating whether alpha-melanocyte stimulatory hormone (α-MSH) can lower blood sugar levels in people with type 1.
Daniel Doherty’s research project aims to make islet transplants last longer and work better to benefit more people with type 1.
Lead researcher, Kourosh, says his study has the potential to transform our understanding of diabetes.
Dr Leslie Johnson will explore whether a collaborative care model that is effective for type 2 diabetes can be adapted for people with type 1.
Dr Chloe Rackham is investigating how supportive cells called mesenchymal stem cells may help protect people from developing type 1.
Dr Ify Mordi is an expert in heart disease and diabetes at the University of Dundee. We are funding Ify to run the first clinical trial of the drug sotagliflozin in people living with type 1 diabetes and heart failure.
In his Breakthrough T1D UK-funded project, Dr Richard Oram is developing a type 1 diabetes risk score to predict who will develop type 1 diabetes in the future. The research Richard and his team at the University of Exeter are doing will help how we screen people for type 1.
We are funding Professor Timothy Tree and his team at King’s College London to support clinical trials of ustekinumab in young people recently diagnosed with type 1 diabetes. The team is analysing blood samples from people taking part in the clinical trials USTEKID and UST1D2.
The Human Islet Isolation Facility provides researchers with pancreas samples from donors with and without diabetes. We have been funding the centre since 2009. The current funding is for Professor Paul Johnson and his team to continue to run the Human Islet Isolation Facility at the University of Oxford. Their goal is to supply 1 million pancreatic islets to research each year.
Dr Emma Berry is working with young people affected by type 1 to develop a digital psychosocial wellbeing screening and monitoring tool at Queen’s University Belfast. Once complete, Emma hopes diabetes clinicians will use her tool to support young people at their diabetes appointments.
Professor Lucy Walker from University College London is running a research project to target a specific type of immune cell in the hope of stopping the immune attack responsible for type 1 diabetes and other autoimmune conditions.
Dr Rocio Sancho is a leading a team of researchers at Kings College London, thanks to a grant from Breakthrough T1D UK. Rocio’s research team are trying to grow better insulin-producing beta cells in their lab by enhancing the gel they grow them in.
Professor Timothy Barrett is a Professor of Paediatrics and Child Health at the University of Birmingham. Thanks to a generous donation from Steve and Sally Morgan in 2019, Timothy is running a trial to try to find out whether a drug used to treat type 2 diabetes can also be used to treat type 1.
Professor Alex Richter is a Breakthrough T1D UK-funded researcher at the University of Birmingham who is developing an improved test to screen children for type 1 diabetes in the UK. Her new test will be more accurate and easier to use than the existing testing systems, which she hopes will encourage more people to get screened for type 1.
Professor Parth Narendran Parth and his team will screen 20,000 children aged 3-13 across the UK for type 1. The ELSA Study will provide crucial insights into practical and effective ways to screen large numbers of children in the UK, laying the groundwork for a potential UK-wide screening programme.
The symptoms of type 1 and type 2 diabetes can overlap in adults, which leads to misdiagnoses. Dr Nicholas Thomas wants to find out whether a simple test to measure someone’s C-peptide levels can help prevent misdiagnoses.
Thanks to funding from Breakthrough T1D UK, Professor Colin Dayan at Cardiff University is setting up a clinical trials platform called T1D Plus. Seven different treatments have already been shown in clinical trials to slow the autoimmune process that attacks beta cells, leading to type 1.
Dr Joanne Boldison is a researcher at the University of Exeter who is studying a type of immune cell called B lymphocytes, known as B-cells for short. She thinks they may be involved developing type 1 diabetes and could be a target for potential treatments for type 1 diabetes.
We have awarded Dr Fiona Docherty from the University of Birmingham funding to grow insulin-producing beta cells from stem cells, which can divide and grow forever and can make any cell type in the body.
Dr Beall’s research will test whether new drugs developed and made at the University of Exeter can reduce the risk of a severe hypo by restoring the body’s ability to sense hypoglycaemia.
Dr Gavin Bewick is a researcher at King’s College London whose research focuses on the cells in the pancreas which produce and release insulin, the beta cells. He is currently developing a drug to protect these beta cells.
This project is looking at a new way to turn stem cells into beta cells in the lab, to better understand what conditions make this process happen efficiently.
Dr Bewick is exploring ways to improve the health, performance and number of beta cells in the body, so that people with type 1 can be less reliant on insulin pumps and injections – or even, one day, live without them completely.
This project aims to overcome two major roadblocks to developing and licensing immunotherapies for people newly diagnosed with type 1 diabetes.
This award will help to fund the next generation of immunotherapy research, enabling more efficient clinical trials, in more locations, so that promising treatments can reach people sooner.
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