Replacement Pancreatic Cells

Beta cells of the pancreas produce insulin – the hormone that controls uptake of glucose into the tissues. In type I diabetes these beta cells are rapidly destroyed by the immune system, while in type II diabetes beta cell numbers dwindle only as the disease progresses – its primary characteristic being insulin resistance. Replacement pancreatic cells, like the ones pictured, including insulin-producing cells (red), have been derived from human embryonic stem cells and used to successfully treat type I diabetes in mice. But whether such cell replacement would be effective in treating type II diabetes, given the underlying insulin resistance, was uncertain. Now researchers have found that indeed the treatment does work in type II diabetic mice, when combined with existing diabetic drugs. Type II diabetes accounts for more than 90 percent of all cases of the disease, so having a new possible treatment on hand could make a vast clinical impact.

Written by Ruth Williams

Ruth Williams

Writer

Ruth is a freelance science journalist based in the US. She's a regular correspondent for The Scientist, and her work has appeared in The Lancet, Nature, Scientific American Mind, BBC Focus and elsewhere. Twitter @rooph

Website

• Image by Jennifer Bruin
• University of British Columbia, Canada
• Originally published under a Creative Commons Licence (BY 4.0)
• Research published in Stem Cell Reports, April 2015