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Prevention research

What can pancreatic function tell us about how quickly type 1 diabetes develops?

We are funding Dr Kathleen Gillespie and her team at the University of Bristol to investigate whether existing tests, used to measure how well the pancreas works, can be used to help predict how quickly a person in the early stages of type 1 diabetes (T1D) will progress.
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Sophie Stephenson 4 February 2025
Content last reviewed and updated: 04.02.2025

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A photo of Professor Kathleen Gillespie, a researcher investigating pancreatic function in type 1 diabetes.

The team’s initial research, using data from identical twins, showed that it is possible to detect small changes in pancreatic function before a person starts to experience symptoms of T1D. This could help us to identify if people in the early stages of developing T1D are likely to progress quickly or more slowly.

How is this different from other research projects?

We know that the pancreas gets smaller with the development of T1D and that this can start happening even before a person develops any symptoms. The team will use existing tests to measure changes in pancreatic function over time and use this as an indirect measure of the size of the pancreas.

What will Kathleen do in this project?

In this project, Kathleen and her team will use existing samples from large research studies and analyse existing data taken from different time points. By analysing multiple samples from identical twins, the team will work out whether certain biological features are linked to when people go on to develop T1D symptoms.

How will this project help people with T1D?

Thanks to research, we can now identify people who are at in the early stages of developing T1D. Unfortunately, we are not able to predict how quickly their condition will progress, this is an essential question for any person who has been told they are at in the early stages of developing T1D. The team hope that this project will improve understanding of how T1D progresses in at these people.

Is Breakthrough T1D UK funding any other research like this?

We are also funding another project being run by Dr Kathleen Gillespie and her team, to investigate how signalling molecules on immune cells might contribute to the development of T1D. That research project will tell us more about how immune cells travel to the pancreas, as well as how they attack and destroy healthy cells in the pancreas.

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