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posted by janrinok on Wednesday February 26 2020, @11:05PM   Printer-friendly
from the we-must-have-cured-mice-from-everything-by-now dept.

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

Researchers have converted human stem cells into insulin-producing cells and demonstrated in mice infused with such cells that blood sugar levels can be controlled and diabetes functionally cured for nine months.

The findings, from researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, are published online Feb. 24 in the journal Nature Biotechnology.

"These mice had very severe diabetes with blood sugar readings of more than 500 milligrams per deciliter of blood—levels that could be fatal for a person—and when we gave the mice the insulin-secreting cells, within two weeks their blood glucose levels had returned to normal and stayed that way for many months," said principal investigator Jeffrey R. Millman, Ph.D., an assistant professor of medicine and of biomedical engineering at Washington University.

Several years ago, the same researchers discovered how to convert human stem cells into pancreatic beta cells that make insulin. When such cells encounter blood sugar, they secrete insulin. Still, previous work has had its limitations and had not effectively controlled diabetes in mice.

Now, the researchers have shown a new technique they developed can more efficiently convert human stem cells into insulin-producing cells that more effectively control blood sugar.

"A common problem when you're trying to transform a human stem cell into an insulin-producing beta cell—or a neuron or a heart cell —is that you also produce other cells that you don't want," Millman said. "In the case of beta cells, we might get other types of pancreas cells or liver cells."

[...] He explained that there still is much to do before this strategy can be used to treat people with diabetes. They will need to test the cells over longer periods of time in larger animal models and work to automate the process to have any hope of producing beta cells that can help the millions of people who currently require insulin injections to control their diabetes. But the research is continuing.

More information: Nathaniel J. Hogrebe et al. Targeting the cytoskeleton to direct pancreatic differentiation of human pluripotent stem cells, Nature Biotechnology (2020). DOI: 10.1038/s41587-020-0430-6


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  • (Score: 2) by DrkShadow on Wednesday February 26 2020, @11:53PM

    by DrkShadow (1404) on Wednesday February 26 2020, @11:53PM (#963223)

    There's a chance! !!!

    There's a chance that this cure might see the light of day! It fits the bill of "Chronic condition with recurring treatment interval," so it just might happen.

    Here's hoping!

    (Also required: surgery every nine months? How do they precisely place them in the pancreas?)

    Off-target pancreas and liver cells don't hurt anything when implanted into a mouse

  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by SpockLogic on Wednesday February 26 2020, @11:56PM (1 child)

    by SpockLogic (2762) on Wednesday February 26 2020, @11:56PM (#963224)

    This is very encouraging for all those suffering from type 1 diabetes. Not a cure but a step in the right direction.

    Hurrah for science.

    --
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    • (Score: 4, Interesting) by barbara hudson on Thursday February 27 2020, @12:03AM

      by barbara hudson (6443) <barbara.Jane.hudson@icloud.com> on Thursday February 27 2020, @12:03AM (#963230) Journal
      Probably aggravate type one. Type one is an auto-immune disease where the body attacks the beta cells until there aren't enough to meet insulin demand. Do you really want to re-awaken a defective auto-immune disorder?

      You go first.

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  • (Score: 2) by barbara hudson on Thursday February 27 2020, @12:01AM (4 children)

    by barbara hudson (6443) <barbara.Jane.hudson@icloud.com> on Thursday February 27 2020, @12:01AM (#963229) Journal

    Don't get your hopes up. Type 1 diabetes is an auto-immune disease, so there's no reason to believe that new beta cells won't also trigger an auto-immune response. And we already can control Type 2 through diet and exercise.

    It's been done before - in the previous century - with actual human beta cells, and it only partially worked. The test subjects still had to continue taking insulin.

    The article is paywalled, so we don't even know if the mice had their beta cells destroyed or were bred to be extra-sweet, or what.

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    • (Score: 3, Interesting) by DrkShadow on Thursday February 27 2020, @12:27AM (1 child)

      by DrkShadow (1404) on Thursday February 27 2020, @12:27AM (#963241)

      Per the summary, first paragraph/sentence,

      functionally cured for nine months.

      This is about half as long as the human islet cell transplants of last century. The benefit here over that is that without a donor host, you don't have to take anti-rejection drugs for your whole life to suppress your immune system. (That's mouse vs human, too though.)

      Yes, your immune system will kill these off, too. Then you'll go in for another treatment, and be good for some more months. The question I have left is: does your body ramp up to kill off these islet cells? Will they last a shorter and shorter duration after each treatment? Or will you get nine months every treatment, for the rest of your life? That would be a whole lot better than four times daily.

      (There are also type 1 diabetics for whom it's not an auto-immune condition. Those people would benefit from a one-time cure.)

      • (Score: 2) by HiThere on Thursday February 27 2020, @01:50AM

        by HiThere (866) Subscriber Badge on Thursday February 27 2020, @01:50AM (#963271) Journal

        More to the point, can they be enclosed in a semi-permeable membrane with large pores that are just to small to let immune system cells through. (Of course, I'm making an assumption as to how the cells are being attacked. If it's with antigens, then coat the inside of the membrane with anti-sense antigens.)

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    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 27 2020, @02:22AM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 27 2020, @02:22AM (#963283)

      Last time I looked into it I thought a few other theories were floating around as to other possible causes. Do you have any thoughts on those?

      • (Score: 2) by barbara hudson on Thursday February 27 2020, @02:58AM

        by barbara hudson (6443) <barbara.Jane.hudson@icloud.com> on Thursday February 27 2020, @02:58AM (#963291) Journal
        Not really. It's definitely genetic. There may be an environmental trigger, but considering that until 150 years ago people died really young as a matter of course, it wouldn't really have stood out, same as cardiovascular disease, all sorts of what we now call "lifestyle diseases" because were living a lot longer.we now say that anyone who dies before 65 died young, but the original social security age was set to 65, almost nobody made it that far.
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