About 10% of all people that suffer from diabetes have type 1, but it is the most common type of childhood diabetes. It is an autoimmune condition that causes the pancreas to stop producing insulin, the hormone that regulates blood glucose levels. If the amount of glucose in the blood is too high, it can seriously damage many body’s organs over time.
According to a study published in the journal Cell, scientists at Harvard University have achieved a breakthrough in the search of an effective treatment against this type of diabetes.
Using human embryonic stem cells as a starting point, they have for the first time been able to create human insulin-producing beta cells. The lab-produced beta cells are practically equivalent in every way to beta cells naturally produce in the pancreas. Moreover they can be produced in the large quantities needed for cell transplantation and pharmaceutical purposes.
Study Leader Doug Melton, Xander University Professor at Harvard University, said he hopes to have human transplantation trials using the cells under way within a few years.
Currently, Melton’s team is doing trials using these cells in animal models, including non-human primates.
Prof Melton, who is also co-director of the Harvard Stem Cell Institute, said that they are testing a device, which so far has protected beta cells implanted in mice from immune attack for many months.
“[While] there have been previous reports of other labs deriving beta cell types from stem cells, no other group has produced mature beta cells as suitable for use in patients,” he said. “The biggest hurdle has been to get to glucose-sensing, insulin-secreting beta cells, and that’s what our group has done.”
Beta cell transplantation as a treatment for diabetes is still essentially experimental. It uses cells from cadavers, requires the use of powerful immunosuppressive drugs and has been available to only a very small number of patients.
Professor Elaine Fuchs, of Rockefeller University, described the findings as “one of the most important advances to date in the stem cell field”.
La profesora Elaine Fuchs, de la Universidad de Rockefeller, describe este hallazgo como “uno de los avances más importantes hasta la fecha en el campo de las células madre”.
“For decades, researchers have tried to generate human pancreatic beta cells that could be cultured and passaged long term under conditions where they produce insulin. Melton and his colleagues have now overcome this hurdle and opened the door for drug discovery and transplantation therapy in diabetes,” she said.
Through: The Guardian
