A new chapter in the academic and scientific collaboration between Israel and Australia was turned with the launch of a new Israel-Australia research centre in Tel Aviv. The centre will involve major participation of Australia’s prestigious Monash University and Tel Aviv Medical Center, which is Israel’s largest health institution, apart from the Sagol Center for Epigenetics of Metabolism and Aging. The centre is based at the Tel Aviv Medical Center Sagol family in Israel and Sami Sagol are the major patrons of the new centre.
Paul Zimmet AO, Professor of Diabetes at Monash, will become the centre’s Co-director (honorary) with Professor Naftali Stern, Director of the Institute of Endocrinology, Metabolism and Hypertension at Tel Aviv Medical Center.
Epigenetics is a new field of research, where the changes in the genetic material surrounding genes that are induced by the environment are studied.
Professor Zimmet, an international leader in diabetes research, believes some of these translate into adult disorders such as ageing, obesity and type 2 diabetes and may be passed down between generations or acquired during a lifetime.
“If you think of type 2 diabetes, for example, everyone thinks it’s all genetic,” Professor Zimmet said.
“But only about 20 per cent of risk of type 2 diabetes has been shown to be associated with genes. There’s a whole belief now that the role of environment makes up a considerable part of that risk.”
The centre will aim to reveal epigenetic changes in body organs that contribute to ageing and disease, attempt to discover which changes are experimentally reversible then strive to develop practical therapies to reverse such changes to delay ageing and diseases such as type 2 diabetes.
It is part of a network of research centres established in academic and medical centres by the Sagol family, focusing on the advancement of research on longevity and quality of life.
