According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, more than 30 million Americans – or nearly 9.5 percent of the U.S. population – have diabetes. Another 84 million have prediabetes, a condition that if left untreated often leads to type 2 diabetes within five years.
Eight-year-old Anthony Giles lives in the Indianapolis area with his parents, Garrett and Becky, sisters Katherine and Adeline, and brothers Luke and Gabriel. Anthony was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes when he was 19 months old.
His parents had to carefully monitor his blood sugar and give him diluted insulin injections until he could be fitted with a portable insulin pump at 20 months. The pump, which he still wears today, continues to give him the autonomy he needs to essentially have a normal childhood.
Our quest for a cure
The cause of diabetes is unknown, and the disease cannot be prevented based on current knowledge. But Anthony and his family, and the millions like them, inspire us at the Indiana Biosciences Research Institute (IBRI) to conduct advanced research to find ways to slow and eventually cure diabetes.
With our motto, Discovery With Purpose, we focus on understanding the disease as much as possible and aim to develop new therapeutics that will not only better manage the disease and its complications but prevent its onset altogether.
Diabetes research is only part of our story. In this annual report, we highlight our other advanced research into single cell analytics, applied data sciences and pharmaceutical Biotechnology – all with the common goal of improving outcomes for patients in Indiana and around the world by fostering collaborative research with academia and industry.