Investigating the role of S-acylation in pancreatic beta cells

Correct insulin secretion from pancreatic beta cells is critical for human health, with defects in insulin secretion leading to hyperglycaemia, diabetes and its associated detrimental complications. beta cell dysfunction is a hallmark of diabetes, with a greater understanding of beta cell function required to both understand diabetes progression, alongside developing new and targeted therapies to restore beta cell function.

S-acylation is a post-translational modification with key physiological roles in different cell types, however its role in bets cell function is not yet known.

Previous investigations have identified that several critical nodes of a key bets cell pathway are acylated, however the role of S-acylation in this pathway and in beta cell function is not yet known.

Therefore, this project will use unbiased quantitative proteomic approaches, coupled with targeted acylation assays in beta cell lines, primary mouse and human islets to investigate the role of S-acylation in pancreatic beta cells.