Wicklow - type 2 diabetes and epigenetics

The research we’re doing right now is to look and see whether or not the expression of DNA is different for an infant born to a mom with type 2 diabetes versus an infant that is born to a mom that does not have type 2 diabetes. The expectation is that there will be differences in how genes are expressed that are important in the role of pancreatic development.  So whether or not it is the number of beta cells or insulin secreting cells that an infant is born with, the size of the pancreas in terms of insulin and glucagon secreting cells, how well those beta cells function in terms of how much insulin that they can secrete at any given time.  So all of the genes that are very important in the development and function of insulin secreting cells have the potential to be affected by methylation and differential methylation so that we can shut some of them off and turn some of them on. The thought is that we can change the risk by changing whether or not those certain genes are turned off or on based on whether or not a child is exclusively breastfed. So we’ll look at methylation patterns before we look at breastfeeding and then after an intervention of breastfeeding to see if we can see differences in methylation patterns in infants. As a hint as to why, you know, they have an increased risk and why breastfeeding might be protective from that increased risk.