Douglas A. Melton has a single, overriding goal: finding a cure for his nine-year-old son, Sam, and millions of others with type I (juvenile) diabetes. This is why Melton, an HHMI investigator at Harvard University, stopped focusing on the early development of frogs, in which he had done pioneering studies, and started research on mouse development. It's also why he is now leading a major drive to turn human embryonic stem (ES) cells into the special kind of pancreatic cells, called beta cells, that supply what diabetics lack: insulin. continued...

Photo: Y. Nikes/Stone

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Reprinted from the HHMI Bulletin,
March 2002, pages 10-17.
©2002 Howard Hughes Medical Institute