Predictive biology at JAX

The Cube Initiative proof-of-concept: type 2 diabetes

As a key part of our work in predictive biology, The Cube Initiative launched with a bold two-year proof-of-concept project that focuses first on a single disease entity: type 2 diabetes.

Why type 2 diabetes?

• It’s a common disease with high morbidity, affecting 500+ million people worldwide and growing, and with significant societal impact, costing $327 billion in the U.S. alone in 2017.
• The problem concerns nations across the globe and also accentuates dementia and liver disease.
• Much is known about the genetics of the human disorder with more than 230 genetic variants associated with type 2 diabetes, but these are mainly statistical associations; how they function, and interact together, remains unsolved.
• Our most recent work has shown that our mouse models of the disease mimics at the genetic level the complex interactions implied by the human data.

The goal?

To unlock the genetic and biological complexity of type 2 diabetes, through the power of mouse models, human data and computational power so that we can make clinical predictions and uncover unique biomedical solutions that can be translated into the clinic.

JAX researchers are focused on integrating and analyzing the thousands of rich datasets that have resulted from this two-year, large scale type 2 diabetes data generation.