June 11, 2017
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ADA recognizes researcher for work in diabetes during pregnancy

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Gernot Desoye, PhD, was honored with the Norbert Freinkel Award from the American Diabetes Association at the organization’s annual meeting.

The award recognizes a researcher who has made outstanding contributions to the understanding and treatment of diabetes in pregnancy.

Endocrine Today spoke with Desoye, who is research director and associate professor of medical biochemistry in the department of obstetrics and gynecology at the Medical University of Graz, Austria, about his work on maternal overnutrition and the possible effects on the fetus.

What area of your field most interests you right now and why?

Desoye: My focus of interest is to understand how the placenta is affected by both the maternal and fetal environment in situations of maternal overnutrition, that is, in maternal diabetes and/or obesity, and how this, in turn, may affect the fetus. There has been the long-standing opinion in the field that the manifold placental changes in maternal overnutrition are detrimental to the fetus and contribute to the fetal phenotype, ie, excessive fat accretion. However, this has turned out to be wrong, or at least there is no evidence to support this assumption late in pregnancy. This raises the question now what the consequences of these changes are. My current view is that they are a manifestation of placental adaptation to the altered environments and ultimately serve to protect the fetus from serious adverse effects, rather than do harm. I am also excited about the idea, for which there is circumstantial evidence, that these adaptive responses are more pronounced in female than in male fetuses. The preference of female fetuses in reproductive outcomes seems to be a fundamental principle and raises questions about the evolutionary pressure on adaptive systems.

What has been the greatest challenge in your professional career thus far?

Desoye: I am an out-of-the-box thinker and try to combine knowledge about placental processes and function with maternal and fetal (patho)physiology. This makes me often take a view different from that of others. As already mentioned, I do not think that the placenta actively contributes to fetal overnutrition and, hence, excessive fetal fat accretion, at least late in gestation, but this has been against dogma for more than 15 years. I have realized that changing established opinion and challenging the field with innovative ideas is oftentimes not all too welcome and met with considerable resistance. This slows down advances in the field and represents the real challenges that I have encountered in science.

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What do you think will have the greatest influence on your field in the next 10 years?

Desoye: My expectation is along two lines of work: First, I hope that much emphasis will be put on understanding early events in pregnancy and how they are shaped and affected by maternal overnutrition. In particular, the long-term consequences of these early events for later pregnancy and how these can be prevented, or at least diminished, will form a focus of future research and have strong influence in the field. Within my own area of placenta research, I am also presuming that the early environmental factors determining placental growth and functional trajectories will be delineated, with a strong focus on epigenetic changes. Second, I am expecting that the “omics” technologies will allow establishing biomarkers to identify women at risk for developing gestational diabetes and, after pregnancy, for type 2 diabetes. Moreover, biomarkers could also help in assessing newborns’ risk for developing features of metabolic syndrome, one of the long-term consequences for the offspring of diabetes and obesity in pregnancy. Ultimately, these advances in predicting adverse conditions will hopefully be translated into novel health care strategies.

What advice would you offer to a student going into your field today?

Desoye: En vogue topics in science are always following waves and hypes. Students are advised not to change their field of interest following these trends, but to pursue what they are really interested in and what they are enthusiastic for. A strong determination to solve a medical/biological question is one of the key prerequisites for a successful scientific career. In the quest for finding such solutions, students should take a look beyond their core scientific interest, be open for other disciplines and try to work in a multidisciplinary team. Moreover, students should seek experienced mentors with strong standing in the field, who are enthusiastic about their own science and who, at the same time, can also moderate students’ expectations.

What are your hobbies/interests outside of work?

Desoye: Science requires deep analytical thinking as well as free associative and creative floating of thoughts, which I call “lateral thinking.” My hobbies are in line with these requirements: I am a chess player, though poor, as well as a jogger. Discipline and structured thinking are trained in chess, while I can reach an almost meditative state during jogging, in which my brain is unfocused and can combine loose ends across several scientific disciplines. I am also interested in international politics, although this is somehow depressing at times. – by Cassie Homer

Disclosure: Desoye reports no relevant financial disclosures.