Skip to main content
Premium Trial:

Request an Annual Quote

Sistemic, NHS Scotland Developing Biomarkers for Diabetes-related Sight Loss

NEW YORK (GenomeWeb News) – Sistemic today announced an agreement with NHS Scotland to develop biomarkers for the early detection of diabetic retinopathy and infective keratitis.

Financial and other terms of the deal were not disclosed.

In a statement, Sistemic Chief Scientific Officer Vincent O'Brien said that while the increase in people with diabetes is well documented, "less well appreciated is that retinopathy is the largest cause of blindness in working age people and has a massive impact on quality of life as well as a huge cost burden on the NHS. … The potential to combine the Sistemic technology for understanding changes in miRNA and then using these to guide understanding of what is happening inside the eye is a very exciting prospect."

Headquartered in Glasgow, UK, Sistemic provides miRNA-based services and kit-based products to the pharmaceutical, biotechnology, and cell therapy markets. Among the products it offers are those for miRNA profiling, the analysis of changes to miRNAs "when a cell is perturbed by a stimulus," and the analysis of changes to miRNAs within a "multilayered" biological context, the company said on its website.

The Scan

Hormone-Based Gene Therapy to Sterilize Domestic Cat

A new paper in Nature Communication suggests that gene therapy could be a safer alternative to spaying domestic cats.

Active Lifestyle Linked to Type 2 Diabetes Prevention in People at High Genetic Risk

A study in the British Journal of Sports Medicine shows that an active lifestyle goes a long way in type 2 diabetes prevention.

Beneficial, Harmful Effects of Introgression Between Wild and Domesticated European Grapes

A paper in PNAS shows that European wild grapevines were an important resource for improving the flavor of cultivated wine grapes.

Genetic Ancestry of South America's Indigenous Mapuche Traced

Researchers in Current Biology analyzed genome-wide data from more than five dozen Mapuche individuals to better understand their genetic history.