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Friday, 05 Jul, 2019
DYNAMO: Global diabetes experts review progress of large, collaborative diabetes study in Singapore
SINGAPORE, 5 July 2019 – Diabetes is one of the leading causes of chronic kidney disease and Singapore has among the highest rates of diabetes-induced kidney failure worldwide. Capitalising on a confluence of world-class expertise in research on diabetes and its complications in Singapore, the Diabetes studY in Nephropathy And other Microvascular cOmplications (DYNAMO) was launched in 2017 to focus basic and clinical research toward reducing the prevalence of DKD in Singapore and around the world.
Two years on, the Scientific Advisory Board of DYNAMO have convened in Singapore to review the study’s progress, and to share the latest scientific insights on diabetic kidney disease (DKD) at a half-day symposium held in conjunction with the review. Three members of the Scientific Advisory Board based overseas travelled to Singapore for the review and spoke at the symposium:
- Professor Katalin Susztak, professor of Medicine and Genetics at the University of Pennsylvania, USA, presented on ‘Advances in diabetic kidney disease: What we learned from Single Cell Sequencing’,
- Professor Mark Cooper, Head of the Department of Diabetes, Central Clinical School, Monash University, Australia, presented on ‘New targets for diabetic kidney disease’.
- Professor Nick Wareham, Director, MRC Epidemiology Unit, and Co-Director, Institute of Metabolic Science, School of Clinical Medicine, University of Cambridge, presented on ‘Genetic determinants of diabetes and obesity traits’.
Professor Thomas Coffman, Dean of Duke-NUS Medical School and the Lead Principal Investigator (PI) of DYNAMO, remarked, “DYNAMO represents what we can accomplish to improve the lives of those affected and at risk of the disease when we combine the world-class research and infrastructure in Singapore with the confluence of talented investigators with a passion to address this problem.”
DYNAMO was developed in response to a call from the Ministry of Health’s (MOH) National Medical Research Council (NMRC) for research on diabetes to work toward a 30 percent reduction in the prevalence of DKD in Singapore over five years. The global collaborative study, which involves 70 clinicians and scientists spanning six countries and 25 institutions, including A*STAR, Singapore General Hospital, Singapore National Eye Centre, National University Health System, Khoo Teck Puat Hospital, Duke-NUS Medical School and Lee Kong Chian School of Medicine, received an award of approximately S$25 million from the Open Fund–Large Collaborative Grant (OF–LCG) Programme supported by the National Research Foundation (NRF) Singapore and administered by NMRC.