Briefs

CAMBRIDGE, May 29, 2006 — Researchers at the Cambridge Institute for Medical Research (CIMR) in the U.K. and the Institute for Systems Biology in Seattle have created a new, web-based resource for type 1, or juvenile diabetes (T1D) research, which they used in identifying a sixth genetic locus associated with T1D. The locus discovered contains a gene associated with programmed cell death of virus-infected cells, and could be a link between noted cases of viral infection and the onset of type 1 diabetes.

Type 1 diabetes is a childhood and young adult autoimmune disorder in which the immune system mistakenly kills off insulin-producing beta cells in the pancreas, leaving patients prone to complications such as blindness and kidney dysfunction later in life.

A team of scientists, led by Luc Smink, head of genome informatics at the CIMR’s Diabetes and Inflammation Laboratory and Nathan Goodman at the Institute for Systems Biology (ISB), developed T1DBase, an open-source database that can be accessed and amended by T1D researchers world-wide.

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