Our 3 Main Goals:

1. To improve quality of life for all with type 1 diabetes

2. To provide life-saving islet transplantation for those at highest risk from dangerous hypoglycaemia

3. To pioneer curative therapies, leading to long-term freedom from daily insulin injections  

Group Leader:

James Shaw - Professor of Regenerative Medicine for Diabetes and Honorary Consultant Physician at Newcastle Diabetes Centre and the Freeman Hospital.

Why Donate?

This is a very positive time for those affected by Type 1 diabetes - with the real prospect of a future without long-term complications almost within reach.

In addition to our existing grant funding*, we are absolutely dependent on further donations through this website to maintain and increase our international competitiveness and too eventually find a cure for Type 1 diabetes.

So far, funding has allowed us to establish the Islet Isolation and Innovation Hub at Newcastle University, a unique facility dedicated to the manufacture of human insulin-producing islets of the highest quality from research donor pancreas. These islets are vital for enabling key research projects within the Newcastle University Institute of Cellular Medicine and the North East Stem Cell Institute, as well as with our collaborators worldwide. Our research targets curative therapies for diabetes as well as deepening our understanding of diabetes in all of its forms.

Newcastle University’s Hub is aiming to develop a cost-effective process to ensure a constant supply of this invaluable resource for laboratory studies from pancreas provided through the selfless generosity of organ donors and their families.

Currently, each islet isolation takes up to 8 hours with 3 highly experienced members of staff and costs £4,000 to complete.

Our goal is to raise £24,000 to acquire state-of-the-art equipment to aid the islet isolation process, which will free up our highly skilled scientists and allow them to focus on other aspects of this crucial research.

Please donate generously and help our world class Newcastle Research Team to eliminate the suffering and complications cause by Type 1 diabetes. Your local support is crucial.

The Newcastle team is absolutely dedicated to ensuring that therapeutic breakthroughs for Type 1 diabetes patients are made here, in the North East, and are translated into clinical benefit as quickly as possible regionally, nationally and around the world.

*from Diabetes UK, the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, the Diabetes Research and Wellness Foundation and the Medical Research Council

Recent Successes from Group:

- The HypoCOMPaSS study, which has confirmed that severe hypoglycaemia can be sustainably prevented in 80% of people who have had Type 1 diabetes for many years and have lost hypoglycaemia (low sugar reactions) awareness.

- The Freeman Hospital is a leading centre for transplantation of insulin-producing pancreatic islet cells. The Newcastle team has recently published evidence confirming how effective this procedure is for those with life-threatening hypoglycaemia.

- Based on charitable donation from the Foundation of Edith and Arthur Wilson, Newcastle University has established the Islet Isolation and Innovation Hub at the International Centre for Life. This is unique in the UK in employing an international team of clinically experienced islet isolators to focus on new approaches which we believe will lead to transformative successes in regenerative medicine for diabetes over the coming years.

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