Next Steps in Potential Stem Cell Therapy for Diabetes

Via UC San Diego News Center:

Type 1 and type 2 diabetes results when beta cells in the pancreas fail to produce enough insulin, the hormone that regulates blood sugar.  One approach to treating diabetes is to stimulate regeneration of new beta cells. 

There are currently two ways of generating endocrine cells (cell types, such as beta cells, that secrete hormones) from human embryonic stem cells, or hESCs: either generating the cells in vitro in culture or transplanting immature endocrine cell precursors into mice.

Researchers from the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine, collaborating with scientists from San Diego-based biotech company ViaCyte, Inc., looked at the differences and similarities between these two types of hESC-derived endocrine cell populations and primary human endocrine cells, with the longer-term goal of developing new stem cell therapies for diabetes.

Read more: http://ucsdnews.ucsd.edu/pressrelease/next_steps_in_potential_stem_cell_therapy_for_diabetes