U.S.-Australia Joint Seminar: Changing Paradigms for Desert Diets and Diabetes among Australian Aborigines and Native Americans; Alice Springs, Australia, November 1992

在Native Seeds.Search的Gary Paul Nabhan和澳大利亚组织者悉尼大学生物化学系的Janette C.Brand的指导下，八位美国专家(外加美国国立卫生研究院资助的分子生物学领域的其他美国参与者)，在营养、种群生物学、生态学和人类学将前往爱丽丝·斯普林斯，1992年11月，澳大利亚与澳大利亚同行举行为期一周的会议，讨论改变饮食习惯对非胰岛素依赖型糖尿病发病率的影响两国本土沙漠人口中的糖尿病(NIDDM)，美国索诺兰沙漠说皮马语的印第安人和澳大利亚中部沙漠说阿兰迪亚语的土著居民。在为期五天的会议中，与会者将评估为解释二战后NIDDM迅速上升而提出的各种假说，尝试：确定原住民饮食和生活方式的哪些因素以前保护了这些遗传易感人群免受糖尿病的影响；阐明两个沙漠对营养生态资源的遗传反应的相似性和制约因素的平行进化模式；并考虑哪些传统生活方式、饮食和药物可作为旨在预防或控制当代土著人民非胰岛素依赖型糖尿病的有效干预措施。研讨会的重要性不仅在于它应该开发的基本信息和它将推动的未来合作研究计划，也是为了帮助当地沙漠居民改变他们的饮食以避免这种类型的糖尿病。

Under the direction of Gary Paul Nabhan of Native Seeds.SEARCH, and Australian organizer, Janette C. Brand of the Department of Biochemistry, University of Sydney, eight U.S. specialists (plus additional NIH-supported U.S. participants in the field of molecular biology) in various aspects of nutrition, population biology, ecology and anthropology will travel to Alice Springs, Australia in November 1992 to meet for a week with Australian counterparts to discuss the effects of changing dietary habits on the incidence of non-insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus (NIDDM) in indigenous desert populations in both countries, the Pima- speaking Indians of the U.S. Sonoran Desert and the Arandic-speaking aborigines of the Central Australian Desert. Over the five days of meetings, the participants will evaluate various hypotheses proposed to explain the rapid post-World War II rise in NIDDM, trying: to determine which factors of aboriginal diet and lifestyle formerly protected these genetically susceptible populations from developing diabetes; to elucidate patterns of parallel evolution which can account for the similarities in genetic responses to nutritional-ecological resources and constraints characteristic of the two deserts; and to consider which elements of traditional lifestyle, diet and medicine may serve as effective interventions aimed at preventing or controlling NIDDM among contemporary indigenous peoples. The seminar is important not only for the basic information it should develop and the future cooperative research plans it will promote, but also for helping native desert populations to modify their diets to avoid this type of diabetes.