Recent Major Findings

DRC faculty members at UCSD & UCLA represent a highly productive and diverse group of 122 accomplished scientists across broad areas of diabetes and metabolism research. These faculty have produced numerous impactful discoveries, as demonstrated by over 1650 papers since 2015, with 110 papers published in Cell journals, 16 in Science journals, 90 in Nature journals, 35 in the Journal of Clinical Investigation, 19 in eLIFE, 40 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, in addition to several other high-impact journals.

 

In addition, our Research Base faculty have generated over $76 million in direct cost funding for diabetes and metabolism-related research per year over the past project period, including many R01 grants.

 

Our faculty have produced a number of substantial findings over recent years, most of which involved collaborative efforts and relied heavily on the DRC Biomedical Research Cores. These include the following.

 

  • Major advances in studies on the molecular actions of insulin and other hormones
  • the role of inflammatory processes in obesity and diabetes
  • Physiology of glucose and lipid metabolism
  • Developmental biology of the endocrine pancreas
  • Genetics of both Type 1 and 2 diabetes and their complications
  • Molecular underpinnings of NASH and NAFLD
  • Discovery and development of novel drugs for diabetes, obesity and related diseases

 

These highlights serve as representative examples of the quality of the science and the nature of the collaborations that make up our Center.