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Mission Statement
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Our objective is to find the cure for Type 1 Diabetes in the safest, fastest and most efficient way possible.
To do this we will engage in scientific collaborations with other leading research institutions through a partnership arrangement to be known as the Diabetes Research Institute Federation.
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Dr. James Shapiro, MD PhD FRCS (Eng) FRCSC
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 Director, Clinical Islet Transplant Program, University of Alberta; CIHR-Wyeth-Ayerst Clinical Research Professorial Chair in Transplantation
Born in Leeds, England, Dr. James Shapiro obtained his medical degree at the University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne and further trained in surgery at the University of Bristol. He first became interested in islet transplant for diabetes 18 years ago, when as a young medical student he spent a year working on islet research.
Dr. Shapiro went to Canada in 1993 and continued his research studies in experimental islet transplantation and clinical training in liver transplant surgery. His PhD studies initially involved the screening of new drug combinations for possible testing in islet transplantation. He then further trained in liver surgery in Vancouver, in living donor liver transplant surgery in Japan, and in whole pancreas transplant surgery at the University of Maryland. In 1998, he was recruited back to the University of Alberta as a multi-organ transplant surgeon with a strong background in clinical immunosuppression and experimental islet transplantation research.
As the new director of the Clinical Islet Transplant Program, Dr. Shapiro was given the mandate to reactivate the program and lead the clinical team. With doctors Lakey, Ryan, Rajotte, Kneteman and Korbutt, and a dedicated team of clinical and laboratory staff, he developed and tested a new protocol that used a steroid-free anti-rejection regimen along with sufficient numbers of transplanted islets. Using this protocol, clinical success was improved from 8% to 100% insulin independence at one year.
Dr. Shapiro was the lead author in an article published in the New England Journal of Medicine; the editors regarded this breakthrough with such high significance that they released the publication six weeks ahead of schedule as a priority on June 6, 2000. This research has become known as the “Edmonton Protocol,” and has since galvanized research activity in clinical islet transplantation worldwide.
An extensive network of international collaborations has been developed under his leadership to study islet function, and to monitor tolerance and autoimmune reactivity in the islet recipients receiving immunosuppression.
Dr. Shapiro maintains an active research laboratory investigating new ways to “trick” the immune system into not recognizing transplanted cells as being foreign – a process known as “tolerance” that may soon be translated and tested in clinical islet recipients. Thus, Dr. James Shapiro’s research contributions have been principally focused in transplantation and particularly in improving outcomes of clinical islet transplantation.
Dr. Shapiro has received many awards for his experimental studies on islet research, including the prestigious Hunterian Medal from the Royal College of Surgeons of England, the Gold Medal in Surgery from the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada, The Governor General’s Gold Medal for the best PhD thesis in 2001, and International Young Investigator awards from the American Society of Transplantation two years in a row. He recently received an honorary Doctorate in Science from the University of Athabasca. He has also just been appointed as the CIHR-Wyeth-Ayerst Clinical Research Professorial Chair in Transplantation, an extremely prestigious Canadian appointment following national competition. He a member of the Immune Tolerance Network, member of Council for the International Islet and Pancreas Transplant Association (IPITA), and is an active reviewer on the grant panel for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation. He sits on the editorial board of the journal Transplantation and Diabetes Therapeutics and Technology, and is an active reviewer for several journals including Nature Medicine, Transplantation, and The British Journal of Surgery. He was also recently appointed as overall director for a new Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF) Clinical Centre for Islet Transplantation at the University of Alberta – a major five-year $25 million competitively funded grant award to further improve results of islet transplantation.
Dr. Shapiro’s proposed studies in the next several years will allow a safer and more effective islet transplantation to be applied earlier in the course of the disease with less risk to patients. Though he is a leading international figure in islet transplantation, and a much sought after speaker, his major commitment is to maintain the University of Alberta in a lead role to move research progress forward in clinical and experimental islet transplantation, with the ultimate goal of achieving tolerance or near-tolerance in patients - so that one day, islet transplantation could be used safely as a “cure” in all patients with diabetes, including children.
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Dr Peter A Senior, BMedSci (Hons), MBBS (Hons), PhD, MRCP (UK)
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 Assistant Professor, Division of Endocrinology
University of Alberta
Medical Director, Clinical Islet Transplant Program
Co-director, Northern Alberta Diabetic Nephropathy Prevention Program
Dr. Peter Senior completed his medical school and Internal Medicine residency at the University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne in the United Kingdom, and in 2002 received his PhD in “Aspects of Cell Membrane Function in Type 2 Diabetes”.
Between 1999 and 2002, Dr. Senior completed his specialist training in Diabetes and Endocrinology in Newcastle.
In September of 2002, he joined the University of Alberta as an Islet Transplant Fellow working with Dr. James Shapiro. He joined the Faculty of the University of Alberta in 2003 as an Assistant Professor in the Division of Endocrinology. He is the co-director of the Northern Alberta Diabetic Nephropathy Prevention Program. He became the medical director of the Clinical Islet Transplant Program in 2007, where he is actively involved in the clinical and metabolic assessment and follow-up of islet transplant patients.
His research interests include Diabetic Kidney Disease, Clinical Islet Transplantation, and he has written two book chapters, and had 19 publications in peer-reviewed journals, including Diabetes, Diabetes Care, American Journal of Transplantation, Transplantation and British Medical Journal
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