(USA)
Artificial intelligence is set to play a key role in the quest for a ‘world without type 1 diabetes’.
That’s the aim of a new partnership between IBM and JDRF, an international body which funds research into type 1 diabetes (T1D). By combining IBM’s technology with JDRF’s research information, the pair believe they can identify early signs of the disease making it easier to prevent it.
“At JDRF, we are absolutely committed to seeing a world without type 1 diabetes, and with this partnership, we’re adding some of the most advanced computing power in the world to our mission. JDRF supports researchers all over the world, but never before have we been able to analyze their data comprehensively, in a way that can tell us why some children who are at risk get T1D and others do not. IBM’s analysis of the existing data could open the door to understanding the risk factors of T1D in a whole new way, and to one day finding a way to prevent T1D altogether,” said Derek Rapp, JDRF President and CEO.
More than a million people have T1D in America alone and there is currently no cure.
“Nearly 40,000 new cases of type 1 diabetes will be diagnosed in the U.S. this year. And each new patient creates new records and new data points that, if leveraged, could provide additional understanding of the disease.The deep expertise our team has in artificial intelligence applied to healthcare data makes us uniquely positioned to help JDRF unlock the insights hidden in this massive data set and advance the field of precision medicine towards the prevention and management of diabetes,” added Jianying Hu, Senior Manager and Program Director, Center for Computational Health at IBM Research.
