Director of the UAB Comprehensive Diabetes Center (UCDC) Anath Shalev, M.D., attended the Human Islet Research Network (HIRN) 2023 Annual Investigator Meeting in Washington, D.C., where she chaired a session.

Shalev chaired the session Beta Cells on Target: Small Molecules and Extracellular Vesicles in Type 1 Diabetes. She has also been the chair of the HIRN Consortium on Beta Cell Death and Survival (CBDS) since 2019.

Chairing a consortium is considered a great honor among the research community. The chair leads the consortium, encouraging collaboration among members from across the nation, moderates the consortium’s regular virtual meetings and represents it at the Trans Network Consortium.

The CBDS currently has several active projects. Most projects within the consortium focus on human pancreatic islets to discover mechanisms of cellular stress or dysfunction that may contribute to the development of autoimmunity and beta cell loss in at-risk individuals. This should help researchers to develop innovative strategies to stop beta cell destruction early in the disease process.

Other members of HIRN from the UCDC include Sasanka Ramanadham, Ph.D., and Guanlan Xu, Ph.D., who are also members of the Consortium on Beta Cell Death and Survival. Xu also gave a talk titled, “Verapamil promotes beta-cell IGF-1 signaling” at the annual investigator meeting.

HIRN was founded in 2014 to help organize and support collaborative research related to the loss of functional beta cell mass in Type 1 Diabetes. The HIRN currently consists of over 60 distinct NIH-funded research grants affiliated with one of five consortia.