Latest News

DRC Director's Report - March 2019

Brian T. O’Neill, MD, PhD, assistant professor in the Division of Endocrinology in the Department of Internal Medicine and member of the FOEDRC recently published in the journal Diabetes the discovery that FoxO  proteins, which are transcription factors  that regulate DNA, are the critical regulators of diabetes-related muscle atrophy.

DRC Director's Report - February 2019

The Department of Defense office of the Congressionally Directed Medical Research Programs has awarded DRC member, Ethan Anderson, Associate Professor College of Pharmacy, funding as part of its Peer Reviewed Medical Research Program (PRMRP) Discovery Award competition. The project is: Exploiting the Paracrine-Like Effect of Prohibitin-1 to Treat Septic Cardiomyopathy. The grant will provide $310,000 in total support over a 2-year period.

DRC Director's Report - January 2019

The new year is always a time to look back and reflect on the many achievements of the prior year. I have been pleased that the Fraternal Order of Eagles has committed continued support to a program that will be overseen by the FOEDRC that seeks to develop new treatments for diabetes and its complications and to bring them ultimately to market. The Bridge to the cure program represents an innovative collaboration and we are excited by what this new year will bring. For this reason, I have chosen to write about one example from a FOEDRC member that recently demonstrated the ability of the compound nicotinamide riboside to restore nerve damage from chemotherapy. We believe that this same mechanism could lead to improved nerve function in people with diabetes. I hope that you will enjoy reading about this exciting advance below.

DRC Director's Report - December 2018

As we come to the end of another successful year for the FOEDRC, I want to thank the FOE and my colleagues within the Diabetes Research Center for continuing to push the research boundaries to improve the lives of many who suffer from diabetes. On a personal note, I received a number of honors for my work this year including being asked to deliver the Presidential Lecture of the University of Iowa, receiving Fraternal Order of Eagles Humanitarian Award and the 2018 History Makers Award - the African American Museum of Iowa (AAMI). My receipt of this recognition is really a recognition of what you do and I consider myself very fortunate to lead such an outstanding organization. To close out the year I thought you might be interested in reading about some ways that our researchers are turning “fun and games” into a benefit for our patients with diabetes.

DRC Director's Report - December 2018

As we come to the end of another successful year for the FOEDRC, I want to thank the FOE and my colleagues within the Diabetes Research Center for continuing to push the research boundaries to improve the lives of many who suffer from diabetes. On a personal note, I received a number of honors for my work this year including being asked to deliver the Presidential Lecture of the University of Iowa, receiving Fraternal Order of Eagles Humanitarian Award and the 2018 History Makers Award - the African American Museum of Iowa (AAMI). My receipt of this recognition is really a recognition of what you do and I consider myself very fortunate to lead such an outstanding organization. To close out the year I thought you might be interested in reading about some ways that our researchers are turning “fun and games” into a benefit for our patients with diabetes.

Eagles, Iowa Formalize Bridge To The Cure Project

On Tuesday, October 30, The Fraternal Order of Eagles (F.O.E.) Board of Grand Trustees met with leadership from the University of Iowa to formalize the F.O.E.'s Bridge to the Cure project, which aims to translate research projects at the F.O.E. Diabetes Research Center into new medications to help alleviate the effects of diabetes.

With the new agreement, the F.O.E. Diabetes Research Center staff, led by Director Dr. E. Dale Abel, will form a committee, including one Eagles member, to recommend research projects for trial drug testing. Once a recommendation is made, it will be passed along to the F.O.E.'s Board of Grand Trustees, who will determine whether or not to issue a grant from the F.O.E. Diabetes Research Center Fund to facilitate the trials. 

DRC Director's Report - November 2018

We have known for a very long time that obesity is associated with many cardiovascular and metabolic diseases. Type 2 diabetes, fatty liver disease (where liver stores fat in large lipid droplets), coronary artery disease, heart failure, and many more chronic diseases are all linked to obesity.

October 2018 Diabetes Research Center Update

Ryan Boudreau, PhD, Assistant Professor in the Division of Cardiology in the Department of Internal Medicine and a member of the FOEDRC recently discovered a new protein-coding gene in the human genome  that regulates mitochondria. These studies were simultaneously published in the Journal Cell Reports at the same time as a study from a laboratory at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center that made a similar discovery.

Food Allergy Linked To Autism Spectrum Disorder in Children

Our Diabetes Center faculty are leaders in diabetes research but occasionally their research leads them to some other areas that are of broad societal interest. This is exemplified by the work of FOEDRC member Dr. Wei Bao MD Ph.D., who is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Epidemiology, of the University of Iowa’s College of Public Health.

Targeting Mitochondrial Fission for Neuroprotection in Diabetic Neuropathy

Drs. Stefan Strack and Yuriy Usachev Professors of Pharmacology and members of the FOEDRC recently received a new grant from the National Institutes of Health and the National Institutes of Diabetes Digestive and Kidney Disease (NIDDK) entitled “Targeting mitochondrial fission for neuroprotection in diabetic neuropathy” for a total award of $1,702,888 over four years.