Lab Interests:
The Bruin lab is particularly interested in how environmental factors, such as exposure to pollutants, impact the endocrine pancreas during critical windows of fetal development and periods of metabolic stress in adulthood. Current projects we are investigating: a) the role of xenobiotic metabolism enzymes in islets; b) how environmental pollutants impact adult beta cell function and survival; c) the long-term impact of fetal and neonatal pollutant exposure on diabetes risk; d) effects of pollutants on human stem cell differentiation into pancreatic endocrine cells; and e) off-target effects of chemotherapeutic drugs on islets.