8th Annual International Conference on Obesity and Non-Insulin Dependent Diabetes Mellitus: Novel Drug Developments, London, UK, 19-21 April 1999

The 8th Obesity and Non-Insulin Dependent Diabetes Mellitus and Novel Drug Developments Conference organised by International Business Communication, Inc. was held on 19th-20th, April 1999 in London, a followed by an one-day symposium on Novel Drug Developments for NIDDM and Insulin Resistance. More than 100 delegates from both academic and industrial institutes attended the two meetings. The presentations provided insights into the understanding of mechanisms and developments of novel drugs for treatments of obesity and Type 2 diabetes. This review offers a general overview of the fields in appetite suppression, thermogenesis and insulin sensitisation. Discussions focused on several emerging therapeutic areas, including novel compound developments and target identification of receptors, proteins and viruses with the use of conventional methods and recently emerged technologies, such as bioinformatics and invertebrate modelling of human systems.