Thursday November 26 2009 | Biotechnology feed | All feeds
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Thursday November 26 2009 | Biotechnology feed | All feeds
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Advances in artificial insulin secreting cells Type 1 diabetes is a chronic autoimmune endocrine disease that results from the loss of insulin-producing pancreatic beta cells following the action of beta-cell-specific autoimmune responses. Although type 1 diabetes is considerably less common than type 2 diabetes is has a much greater impact on patients due to the earlier onset of disease and the earlier dependency on insulin replacement. The pharmaceutical industry is investing significant effort in improving the delivery of insulin to treat both type 1 and type 2 diabetes and one strategy receiving considerable interest is the development of beta-cell substitutes. This strategy depends on the introduction of an insulin-producing gene into non-beta cells. However, such an approach has encountered a number of obstacles including the absence of an appropriate glucose-sensing system to regulate insulin gene transcription. The tetracycline (Tet)-dependent regulatory system has been widely used for controlling gene expression. The Tet-on version of the system, in which Tet or its analogs, such as doxycycline (Dox) positively regulate the reverse Tet-responsive transcriptional activator, is of potential utility for gene therapy applications in humans. Chinese researchers seeking to control the release of insulin by non-beta cells have exploited this potential. This group has selected from a panel of cells one cell line that responded to Dox with a dose dependent increase in insulin secretion. This effect was observed over a broad range of Dox concentrations and was able to increase the level of insulin secretion by up to 25-fold. This data shows that it is possible to develop artificial beta-cells whose insulin secreting potential can be tightly controlled further highlighting the promise of cellular therapy for diabetes mellitus. Link to journal abstract:
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