A new therapy for type 1 diabetes could nix the need for insulin injections.
Just a single infusion of lab-grown pancreatic cells let patients’ bodies make all the insulin they needed, scientists report. A year after treatment, 10 out of 12 participants no longer needed supplemental insulin.
“This is a landmark study — this cannot be overstated,” says Giacomo Lanzoni, a diabetes researcher at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine who was not involved in the new work. These lab-grown cells can successfully treat diabetes, he says, and the technique to make them can be scaled up. That opens the door to restoring insulin production for many people with the disease.
Vertex Pharmaceuticals developed a method to grow pancreatic islet cells in the lab using human stem cells and a medley of nutrients and chemicals. These lab-grown islets, cell clusters that contain insulin-producing beta cells, don’t wind up in people’s pancreases. Instead, they settle in the liver, a location that seems to work well for them — and patients.
In a small clinical trial of 14 people with type 1 diabetes, doctors infused hundreds of millions of lab-made islet cells into participants’ veins. These cells “start working right from the get-go,” Pagliuca says, sensing blood sugar levels and producing insulin in response. After a full dose of the therapy, called Zimislecel, 10 out of 12 participants once dependent on supplemental insulin no longer needed it — even a year after treatment. Two others reduced their insulin doses by up to 70 percent.
Just a single infusion of lab-grown pancreatic cells let patients’ bodies make all the insulin they needed, scientists report. A year after treatment, 10 out of 12 participants no longer needed supplemental insulin.
“This is a landmark study — this cannot be overstated,” says Giacomo Lanzoni, a diabetes researcher at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine who was not involved in the new work. These lab-grown cells can successfully treat diabetes, he says, and the technique to make them can be scaled up. That opens the door to restoring insulin production for many people with the disease.
Vertex Pharmaceuticals developed a method to grow pancreatic islet cells in the lab using human stem cells and a medley of nutrients and chemicals. These lab-grown islets, cell clusters that contain insulin-producing beta cells, don’t wind up in people’s pancreases. Instead, they settle in the liver, a location that seems to work well for them — and patients.
In a small clinical trial of 14 people with type 1 diabetes, doctors infused hundreds of millions of lab-made islet cells into participants’ veins. These cells “start working right from the get-go,” Pagliuca says, sensing blood sugar levels and producing insulin in response. After a full dose of the therapy, called Zimislecel, 10 out of 12 participants once dependent on supplemental insulin no longer needed it — even a year after treatment. Two others reduced their insulin doses by up to 70 percent.
