A presentation about epigenetic differences between patients with type 2 diabetes specifically caught their attention this year. A recent study by professor Charlotte Ling at LUDC has demonstrated that there are distinct epigenetic differences between different groups of patients with type 2 diabetes.

“Charlotte’s work is very exciting and an example of a new way of understanding cellular biology in type 2 diabetes. In the next couple of years, I hope to see more data about the subgroups from the researchers at LUDC. From a clinical point of view, this kind of knowledge may eventually lead to a more personalised care of diabetes patients,” says Flemming Pociot, professor of endocrinology at the Steno Diabetes Center Copenhagen and University of Copenhagen.

LUDC researchers are well-known for having demonstrated that type 2 diabetes is a heterogeneous disease. Søren Brunak, professor of disease systems biology at University of Copenhagen, would now like to see further investigations of the etiologies of the subgroups.  

“It would be interesting to see studies of mixed etiologies of the subgroups, as some patients may belong to more than one subgroup. This kind of research will generate a lot of data, and LUDC is fortunate to have a relatively large bioinformatics unit with a breadth of competences which I think will be very helpful for the scientists in their future research about the subgroups,” says Søren Brunak.