Symptoms of type 1 diabetes can appear with no warning, and they include blurred vision, feeling very tired, sudden weight loss, and more. Unfortunately, there’s no known cure for this type of diabetes, but that might change soon.
According to SciTechDaily.com, scientists from the Georgia Institute of Technology, University of Missouri, and Harvard University have a new potential treatment for type 1 diabetes that proved useful for animals.
A unique method of tackling type 1 diabetes
The potential treatment includes the transfer of pancreatic islets, meaning pancreas cells that produce insulin. These cells are transferred from a donor to a recipient. Immunosuppressive meds taken for an entire lifetime are no longer needed in this scheme.
Type 1 diabetes is known to occur when our immune system sees the cells that produce insulin in the pancreas as enemies and starts to destroy them.
Yolcu, one of the first authors of the new study, explained as SciTechDaily.com quotes:
A type of apoptosis occurs when a molecule called FasL interacts with another molecule called Fas on rogue immune cells, and it causes them to die,
Therefore, our team pioneered a technology that enabled the production of a novel form of FasL and its presentation on transplanted pancreatic islet cells or microgels to prevent being rejected by rogue cells. Following insulin-producing pancreatic islet cell transplantation, rogue cells mobilize to the graft for destruction but are eliminated by FasL engaging Fas on their surface.
Although nobody denies the usefulness of immunosuppressive drugs, here’s what Dr. Haval Shirwan has to say, as the same source quotes:
The major problem with immunosuppressive drugs is that they are not specific, so they can have a lot of adverse effects, such as high instances of developing cancer,
So, using our technology, we found a way that we can modulate or train the immune system to accept, and not reject, these transplanted cells.
The new study was published in Science Advances.
