When she was just 11 months old, Billie Sue Wozniak’s daughter Juno was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes, an autoimmune disease that affects 1.25 million people and approximately 200,000 children under age 20 in the United States. The disease had affected several members of Billie Sue’s family, including her uncle, who passed away at the age of 30. “My first thought was, ‘Her life is going to be short,'” the 38-year-old from Reno, Nevada recalled.
Category: Diabetes
Scientists Cure Mice of Diabetes Using Cells Grown Inside Rats
In a process that could transform organ transplantation, scientists in Japan and the U.S. have reportedly cured mice of diabetes by transplanting mouse cells grown in rats . The study has been published in the journal Nature .
Rat-grown mouse pancreases help reverse diabetes in mice
Mouse pancreases grown in rats generate functional, insulin-producing cells that can reverse diabetes when transplanted into mice with the disease, according to researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine and the Institute of Medical Science at the University of Tokyo. The recipient animals required only days of immunosuppressive therapy to prevent rejection of the genetically matched rather than lifelong treatment.
Diabetes: Stimulating bone stem cells may improve fracture repair
Researchers have discovered a protein that stimulates bone stem cells in mice with diabetes so that the animals heal better after a fracture. They suggest that this could lead to a new treatment to improve bone repair in people with diabetes.
Replacing missing gut bacteria could help treat children with rare autoimmune disease
Defects in the body’s regulatory T cells cause inflammation and autoimmune disease by altering the type of bacteria living in the gut, researchers from The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston have discovered. The study, “Resetting microbiota by Lactobacillus reuteri inhibits T reg deficiency-induced autoimmunity via adenosine A2A receptors,” which will be published online December 19 in The Journal of Experimental Medicine, suggests that replacing the missing gut bacteria, or restoring a key metabolite called inosine, could help treat children with a rare and often fatal autoimmune disease called IPEX syndrome.