The Diabetic Complications division at the IDC explores transcriptional, epigenetic and signalling components controlling systemic and tissue-specific insulin sensitivity, and tests their potential to serve as novel therapeutic platforms in diabetes prevention approaches.

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Our research investigates the complex interplay between metabolic disorders and cancer, with a particular focus on cancer cachexia—a debilitating syndrome marked by the progressive loss of muscle and fat tissue. Using specialized mouse models and in vitro systems, we aim to identify molecular pathways that drive cachexia, with the goal of uncovering new therapeutic targets. Additionally, we explore the liver’s role in cachexia and apply insights from cancer-associated fat loss to develop novel strategies for obesity treatment.

Our lab explores the idea that obesity/diabetes and cachexia - two metabolically dysregulated states marked by chronic inflammation and dysfunctional nutrient handling - represent opposing manifestations of a shared pathophysiological spectrum, like two sides of the same coin. We investigate how tissues communicate to coordinate systemic metabolic adaptations. By studying these syndromes in the context of each other we seek to uncover unifying principles that may drive conceptual and therapeutic advances across both fields.

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The Metabolic Cancer Reprogramming group investigates how metabolic programs, nutrient fluxes, and metabolite-driven signaling pathways determine cancer cell fate, adaptive states, and therapeutic vulnerability. We aim to define the metabolic principles that enable tumors to progress, resist stress, remodel their microenvironment, and evade immune control.

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We aim to comprehensively identify the range of underlying metabolic causes and consequences that distinguish healthy from unhealthy ageing - ultimately seeking to harness this information to develop novel personalized therapeutics to mitigate unhealthy ageing trajectories, and to recover and maintain health status.

Our lab is interested in deciphering the complex and multifaceted mechanisms that contribute to altered disease susceptibilities across generations. Here, we focus on delineating how changes in metabolism and diet in one generation impact developmental programs, molecular profiles and subsequent health outcomes in the offspring and subsequent generations

Our unit translates IDC research into clinical practice with a focus on therapies for long-term diabetes complications.

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We study novel ligand-receptor pairs, which control key adipocyte functions involved in adipocyte size, energy storage, energy expenditure, ageing dependent malfunction as well as the communication of the adipose tissue with other metabolic organs, such as liver and muscle.

Our lab has a particular focus on the investigation of radiotherapy response and the therapy of tumor recurrences of various cancer entities such as head and neck cancer and glioblastoma.

The major goal of our lab is to understand how endosomal trafficking and metabolism influence and regulate each other. We want to unravel the cellular mechanism how external cues induce changes in cellular metabolism by altering endosomal functions and to provide new cellular tools for treatment of metabolic diseases.

We investigate innate immune responses and endocannabinoid signaling in cardiac repair and vascular disease.

In the Fibrosis Research Unit, we aim to understand the cellular and molecular mechanisms that drive pathological tissue remodeling and scarring. By integrating state-of-the-art spatial, molecular, and computational approaches, we seek to identify key drivers of fibrosis progression and to develop new strategies to prevent or reverse fibrotic disease across multiple organs.

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