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"Many people think that diabetes is a benign disease, but in reality most diabetics run the risk of long-term health consequences such as nerve or heart disease or even blindness," states Lakowicz. Contributing to such risk, he adds, is the difficulty for a diabetic to control his or her blood glucose.
"It sounds simple to just prick your finger. But several times a day, people with Type 1 diabetes must monitor their blood glucose level and give themselves injections," says Lakowicz, "We think these long-term complications of diabetes can be reduced by careful control of the blood glucose concentration." With the new methods, a diabetic will get a patch implanted just under the skin consisting of special fluorescent molecules called fluorophores that respond specifically to glucose. When the person shines shine a red light (a laser diode), onto the skin, the type of light reflected back from the patch will monitor and give a reading of the blood glucose concentration. The fluorophores should provide a completely new and more efficient approach, explains Lakowicz, and can be used with simple portable devices. The researchers will develop several classes of direct-sensing glucose probes, each displaying widely different spectral properties. "More than 16 million people in the United States have diabetes, and it accounts for more than $105 billion in health care costs nationally," says Congressman Benjamin L. Cardin, who represents the third district of Baltimore where both MBC and U.M. School of Medicine are located. "Because taking insulin doesn't cure diabetes or prevent the development of complications, we must encourage innovative research until we find a cure." JDRF is the world's leading nonprofit, nongovernmental funding organization of diabetes research. The disease strikes children suddenly, makes them insulin dependent for life, and carries the constant threat of devastating complications. (For more information on the foundation and juvenile diabetes, click on www.jdrf.org, or call 800-533-CURE.) Lakowicz team is also experimenting with monitoring glucose with proteins from thermophyllic organisms found in extreme environments, such as the hot springs in the middle of the United States, or in the deep wells in the ocean. The American Diabetes Association has recently awarded a grant of $96,000 a year for three years of the research. " So far, we have isolated some of these proteins. They bind glucose and thus change in such a way that we can monitor the amount of glucose using our red light sensor," explains Lakowicz. # # # The University of Maryland Biotechnology Institute was mandated by the state legislature in 1985 as "a new paradigm of state economic development in biotech-related sciences." With five major research and education centers across Maryland, UMBI is dedicated to advancing the frontiers of biotechnology. The centers are the Center for Advanced Research in Biotechnology in Rockville; Center for Agricultural Biotechnology in College Park; and Center of Marine Biotechnology, Medical Biotechnology Center, and the Institute of Human Virology, all in
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