Diabetics help with reprogrammed skin cells

Stem cell research: New therapy could make insulin injections unnecessary in the future

02/10/2014

US researchers have been able to reprogram skin cells in mice with a simplified procedure to insulin-producing cells of the pancreas. The scientists hope that one day Diabetes Type 1 will be preserved in this way.

Skin cells reprogrammed into insulin-producing cells
US researchers have used a simplified procedure to transform skin cells in mice into insulin-producing cells. The team headed by Sheng Ding, of the University of California, San Francisco, bypassed the step of rejuvenating the cells into pluripotent stem cells (which make up each cell type), thereby avoiding the associated tumor risk. The scientists hope that this way one day diabetes type 1 can be cured. They presented their work a few days ago in the journal „Cell Stem Cell“.

Around 300,000 Germans with type 1 diabetes
Congenital diabetes (type 1) is an autoimmune disease in which the body's own immune system attacks and destroys the insulin-producing pancreatic beta-cells through an inflammatory reaction (insulitis). As a result, insulin deficiency increasingly arises, which leads to a lack of substrate in the cells, to an increase in blood sugar, to hyperacidity of the blood, to loss of water and nutrients and to rapid weight loss. If the person does not receive any treatment, a life-threatening clinical picture can develop, the ketoacidotic coma. The cause of the disease is the involvement of many factors that are genetically determined by environmental factors. Currently, about 300,000 Germans suffer from type 1 diabetes.

Patients have to inject insulin throughout their lifetime
In order to control the blood sugar levels, those affected usually have to inject insulin throughout their lifetime. It would therefore be much better if patients could independently produce insulin again, with their own cells without the risk of a rejection reaction. With a chemical cocktail, the Californian scientists did not rejuvenate certain skin cells (fibroblasts) in mice to the pluripotent basic stage, but only to a cellular level, from which various organs can grow, including the pancreas.

Modified cells used in diabetic mice
In a statement from the university, first author Ke Li is quoted: „With another chemical cocktail, we transformed these endoderm-like cells into cells that resemble early pancreatic-like cells.“ It was also said: „Initially, we wanted to see if we could ripen these PPLCs (pancreatic progenitor-like cells) into cells that, like beta cells, respond to chemical signals and - above all - make insulin. Our initial experiments in the Petri dish showed that worked.“ The researchers used these altered cells in a second step in diabetic mice. According to Li, the glucose levels in the animals dropped after one week, and when the scientists took the cells back, the blood sugar level rose again.

Procedure could one day serve as therapy
Eight weeks after transplantation, studies showed that the PPLCs produced functional beta cells that produced insulin. The researchers believe that this is proof that such a procedure could in principle one day serve as a therapy. Heiko Lickert from the Institute for Diabetes and Regenerative Research of the Helmholtz Zentrum München explained that the procedure shows that it is possible to avoid pluripotent stem cells induced by beta-cell reprogramming of fibroblasts and the associated tumor risk: „The researchers do not go all the way back to pluripotency, but only to endoderm-like cells.“ The study shows that it can gain functioning beta cells, „however, the efficiency of beta-cell differentiation is low - yet“, so Lickert. The Institute for Diabetes and Regeneration Research at the Helmholtz Zentrum München participates with eight other project partners in the just launched European research project HumEn, which is intended to promote the production of insulin-producing beta cells from stem cells. (Ad)