Objective
Europe faces a diabetes epidemic. More than 55 million people in Europe are currently diagnosed with diabetes and with an estimated 20% increase by 2030, the disease is certain to stay one of the most challenging health problems this century. Especially as diabetes no longer is a disease exclusively for adults, but affects children, young people and adults of all ages. Despite the high prevalence of diabetes, the choice of anti-diabetic drugs is still limited and two thirds of patients with diabetes do not achieve the recommended glycaemic target levels. For each new anti-diabetic drug, it is essential to investigate the metabolic effect over time. The glucose clamp technique is regarded as the gold standard to evaluate the effectiveness of new anti-diabetic drugs. There are however only a few centers with limited research capacities that have experience in using the clamp technique, because automated clamp devices are no longer commercially available and the existing techniques are confounded by a number of limitations. Increased clamp capacities are urgently needed for the development of new, more efficacious anti-diabetic drugs. Through the integration of newly emerging technologies proposed in part by the 4 participating SME organisations and with the outsourced research capacity of 3 of Europe’s leading RTD performers, the EU-CLAMP project aims to develop a new generation automated clamp device that will overcome the limitations of the existing devices by incorporating microdialysis technique for reliable continuous glucose monitoring without blood loss. The EU-CLAMP project will facilitate clamp testing in a more efficient and cost effective manner. In addition to the significant contribution that will be made to development of improved treatment options for diabetes, the project will provide a platform from which the competitiveness of the participating SMEs can be improved offering alignment to the needs of their long term business strategies.
Fields of science
Topic(s)
Call for proposal
FP7-SME-2010-1
See other projects for this call
Funding Scheme
BSG-SME - Research for SMEsCoordinator
41460 Neuss
Germany