Mariana Gerschenson
University of Hawaii at Manoa, HI·Medicine & Clinical Research
About 11% of people in the United States have diabetes, and 38% have prediabetes. The burden falls unevenly.
- Fields
Medicine & Clinical Research
Public Health & Epidemiology
Physiology
- Topics
diabetes mellitus
type 2 diabetes
insulin resistance
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Apr 2029
What they work on
- Develop minimally invasive sweat sensors that could detect and monitor clinical complications of diabetes.
- Investigate the genomics of diabetes and stroke in Native Hawaiians, a population with high rates of diabetes and its complications.
- Determine what causes diabetic autonomic neuropathy, damage to nerves that run automatic body functions, using a rodent animal model.
- Expand the Metabolic and Analytic Core and add pilot projects and new faculty, to support translational research on diabetes and insulin resistance across the center.
More about the research
Diabetes affects about 27.7% of Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders and 19.3% of Asian Americans, compared with 12.2% of White Americans. Its complications, such as nerve damage and stroke, also occur at higher rates in minority groups. In Hawaiʻi, research that links the basic biology of diabetes to patient care could help reduce these disparities.
Why it matters
Native Hawaiians, Pacific Islanders and Asian Americans have higher rates of diabetes and its complications than White Americans. The center's projects could help these communities in several ways. Sweat sensors could offer a less invasive way to monitor complications. Genomic studies could clarify diabetes and stroke risk in Native Hawaiians. Rodent studies could explain why diabetes damages the nerves that control automatic body functions.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
William Tamborlane
Yale University, CT·Medicine & Clinical Research
Provide shared infrastructure for complex human diabetes studies, such as insulin-glucose clamps, MRI and spectroscopy, PET scans, stable isotope infusions and indirect calorimetry, in adults and children.
Han Tan
University of California-Irvine, CA·Neuroscience·Early-career
Test whether BNC2 neurons, leptin-sensing cells in the hypothalamic arcuate nucleus, control the function of glucose-regulating organs through direct nerve connections.
Morgana Mongraw-Chaffin
Wake Forest University, NC·Medicine & Clinical Research
Strengthen consultation on using continuous glucose monitors in diabetes research, including advanced study design, analytic methods and practical concerns.
The school
University of Hawaii at Manoa: 23 labs on PI Pages, $376M a year on research, 182 research doctorates a year.
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