SDRC PILOT AND FEASIBILITY AWARD PROGRAM
Anna L Gloyn, DPhil
Co-director for the Pilot and Feasibility Program; Professor of Pediatrics (Endocrinology) and of Genetics
Dr. Anna Gloyn uses human genetics as a tool to understand cellular and molecular mechanisms for pancreatic beta cell failure in diabetes and related conditions. Her lab employs several different approaches, including genomics, in vitro human cell models and integrative physiology which are used to study both monogenic forms of diabetes due to rare mutations which are causal for disease through to common variants present in most of the population which increase an individual’s risk for developing diabetes.
She plays leading roles in multiple consortia for genetic discovery efforts for Type 2 diabetes and related glycaemic traits including the NIDDK funded Accelerated Medicines Partnership for common metabolic disease (AMP-CMD). She is co-lead for the International Common Disease Alliance (ICDA) Flagship Disease (Diabetes) and a member of both the Mechanisms and Medicines working groups and on the executive committee of the Atlas of Variant Effects (AVE) Alliance.
She generates genetic data for the NIDDK funded Human Pancreas Atlas Project – Type 2 Diabetes (HPAP-T2D) and since 2020 the Integrated Islet Distribution Program (IIDP) where she heads up the Human Islet Genetic Initiative (HIGI). Dr Gloyn has a long-term collaboration with Patrick MacDonald from the University of Alberta in Edmonton where she has gnomically characterizes human islets from the Alberta Islet Core. These data have been made publicly available through multiple controlled access databases including the European Genome-Phenome Atlas (EGA) and the Translational Human Pancreatic Islet Genotype Tissue-Expression Resource (TIGER) enabling their use by multiple research groups.
Her work has direct translational relevance evidenced by roles on both the ClinGen Expert Review Group for Variant Curation for Monogenic Diabetes and role as chair and co-lead for Precision Diagnostics in Monogenic Diabetes for the American Diabetes Association & European Association for the Study of Diabetes Precision Medicine Working group.
She has been an active part of the Stanford Diabetes Research Center since joining the faculty here in 2020 as co-lead of the Pancreas and Islet Biology Affinity group, a user of the Islet Research and Immune Monitoring Cores, a previous recipient of a P&F Award, and collaborator with many SDRC members.
Sun H Kim, MD MS
Co-director for the Pilot and Feasibility Program; Associate Professor of Medicine (Endocrinology)
Dr. Sun Kim has been conducting patient-oriented research for over a decade. Her research program focuses on mediators of type 2 diabetes development, especially insulin resistance and obesity. She has led studies investigating the epidemiology, pathophysiology and natural history of prediabetes. She was the Stanford lead investigator for the NIH-funded, multi-site Vitamin D and Type 2 Diabetes Study (https://d2dstudy.org/), which examined the benefits of vitamin D3 supplementation in individuals with prediabetes. Dr. Kim also leads efforts to investigate alternative lifestyle interventions and dietary modifications for individuals with prediabetes.
Dr. Kim collaborates with multiple divisions within and outside the Department of Medicine (in cardiology, nephrology, hepatology, immunology and prevention) with the shared goal to reduce the burden of cardiometabolic disease in patients with type 2 diabetes. She focuses on the mechanisms of new and emerging treatments for type 2 diabetes. She has published several papers that highlight her multidisciplinary work to elucidate mechanisms and burden of disease in patients with type 2 diabetes. Dr. Kim also is the endocrine divisional representative for Department of Medicine’s Team Science initiative (https://domteamscience.stanford.edu/)
Within SDRC, Dr. Kim is a co-leader of the Signaling and Metabolism in Diabetes Affinity Group. In addition, her group uses the Clinical & Translational Research Core, and has received support from the P&F Award program (in 2019 and 2021).