Vaccine Reverses Type 1 Diabetes in Mice, Human Trial Begins
The researchers at the Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh reported to have invented the experimental vaccine for the type 1 diabetes. The vaccine has already been tested on animal and is ready to be tested on human being. Safety trial of this vaccine is going on. If approved, the vaccine will enter to the phase 2 trial to decide whether it can be tested on the children suffering from type 1 diabetes.
A separate study group called Type 1 Diabetes TrialNet Study Group, was formed to conduct the study. The network, which is conducting diabetes studies at more than 150 medical centers, has approved the approach in principle, pending completion of initial safety studies and approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
Insulin is the hormone that allows blood glucose to enter cells and be used as energy. Insulin injections, dietary measures, exercise and blood-glucose monitoring are necessary to prevent high blood glucose levels that prompt heart disease, strokes, kidney failure, blindness and circulation problems that can lead to limb amputations.
The Pitt team uses artificially produced “microspheres,” or microscopic containers loaded with nucleic acid. When injected under the skin of mice, the microspheres are swallowed by dendritic cells, or white blood cells, that fight infection. The microspheres release their load of nucleic acid, which prevents the dendritic cells from producing the rogue proteins that signal T-cells to wage an autoimmune attack on beta cells. The pancreas then can regrow beta cells and produce insulin naturally. How long the beneficial effect will last, if it works at all, has yet to be determined.
The experiment will be a hope for America where 1in every 400 to 600 children suffer from type 1 diabetes.
Source:
http://www.post-gazette.com/
Filed under Diabetes, Diabetes Drug, Insulin
