Endocrine Society 2014 Laureate Awards

TY - JOUR

T1 - Endocrine Society 2014 Laureate Awards

AU - Gustafsson, Jan Ake

AU - Katzenellenbogen, Benita

AU - Jameson, J. Larry

AU - Roth, Jesse

AU - Melmed, Shlomo

AU - McDonnell, Donald

AU - Wartofsky, Leonard

AU - Crowley, William F.

AU - Griz, Luiz H.enrique

AU - Becker, Carolyn

AU - Moore, David D.

AU - Drucker, Daniel

AU - Singh, Neelima

AU - O'Malley, Bert

N1 - Funding Information: Dr Accili's beginnings in research can be traced to the pioneering work of Roth, Gorden, Kahn, LeRoith, and Taylor, in their quest to understand how insulin works and to establish structure-function relationships in the insulin receptor using naturally occurring mutations in patients with genetic syndromes of insulin resistance. This led him to an easy transition to the then-burgeoning field of gene knockouts, which he used to extend our knowledge of the insulin signaling pathway. Beginning in the mid-90s, Dr Accili became interested in testing the hypothesis that the forkhead transcription factor Foxo was the long-sought mediator of insulin action on gene expression. This research has led him into surprising and exciting new areas that have furthered our understanding of diabetes pathogenesis, integrated physiology of insulin action, and mechanisms of pancreatic β-cell failure. He is best known for studies defining mechanisms of hepatic insulin action, including glucose production, lipid synthesis, and regulation of bile acid pool composition. He has made significant contributions to the area of insulin resistance and cardiovascular disease, one of the main unmet therapeutic needs in the treatment of diabetes. His work has led to the identification of mechanisms in endothelial cells and liver that explain the intricate relationship between glucose control, insulin sensitivity, and macrovascular atherosclerotic disease. Perhaps his most important contributions to date have been in the area of pancreatic β-cell biology, specifically in the demonstration that β-cell failure, long held to be the consequence of apoptotic cell death, does in fact result from a dedifferentiation process, whereby β cells lose the ability to make insulin, revert to an earlier progenitor stage, and occasionally convert to other hormone-producing cells. Germane to this discovery is the observation that enteroendocrine cells have the potential to give rise to fully functional insulin-producing cells in the gut–a property that is currently being further investigated as a therapeutic opportunity for type 1 diabetes. Dr Accili has received numerous awards, including the American Diabetes Association's Lilly Award, the University of Chicago's Steiner Award, and the Claude Bernard Medal of the European Association for the Study of Diabetes. His work has been published in leading medical journals. A member of several editorial boards, he also serves on numerous advisory panels for academia, government, and industry. He is an elected member of the Association of American Physicians and the American Society for Clinical Investigation. His work is supported by the NIH, the American Diabetes Association, the Russell Berrie Foundation, the Brehm Coalition, and the JPB Foundation.

PY - 2014/10/1

Y1 - 2014/10/1

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84929514980&partnerID=8YFLogxK

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=84929514980&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1007/s12672-014-0193-y

DO - 10.1007/s12672-014-0193-y

M3 - Article

C2 - 25091407

AN - SCOPUS:84929514980

SN - 1868-8497

VL - 5

SP - 339

EP - 355

JO - Hormones & cancer

JF - Hormones & cancer

IS - 5

ER -