Human Stem Cells Can Be Converted Into Beta Cells Producing Insulin

Human stem cells can do wonders. It can reportedly help your body produce insulin and regulate your glucose levels.

Stem Cells Insulin

The beta cells of the pancreas that produce insulin, which aids in converting sugar into energy, can be genetically predisposed by the human body to attack its cells. Type 1 diabetes is a condition that can strike at any age and that, if not carefully treated with insulin injections or an insulin pump to balance the body's sugar levels, can be fatal, per ScienceDaily.

However, according to Xiaojun "Lance" Lian, an associate professor of biomedical engineering and biology at Penn State, there might be a different, more tailored choice shortly. Lian and his team improved the efficiency and cost-effectiveness of the technique by turning human stem cells into beta cells capable of manufacturing insulin in the laboratory for the first time.

Through environmental cues, stem cells can differentiate into different cell types, and some adult cells can return to stem cells (induced pluripotency). The scientists discovered that their strategy worked for human embryonic and induced pluripotent stem cells, both obtained from stem cell lines that had received government approval.

Lian believes that the efficacy of their method may diminish or even completely remove the necessity for human embryonic stem cells in future research.

According to Lian, diabetes is a serious illness in the United States and other countries. The ability of the patient to manufacture insulin and control their blood glucose levels is destroyed by their immune cells. Lian believed stem cells would be able to resolve the issue and allow a person to control their insulin and glucose levels again.

Through laboratory manipulation or environmental influences, stem cells can differentiate into any form of cell. Finding the exact circumstances that will cause a stem cell to develop into a functional state of the chosen cell type is difficult, according to Lian.

Diabetes might be reversible if stem cells could be transformed into pancreatic beta cells and then given back to the patient, according to Lian. It's a challenging question. For more than 20 years, scientists have been looking for the answer. Our lab understood that we needed to adopt a different strategy.

The study was published in the journal Stem Cell Reports.

Stem Cells From Human Stomach For Insulin

In a different study, researchers demonstrated that they could directly reprogram stem cells isolated from human stomach tissue into cells that closely resemble beta cells, the insulin-secreting cells in the pancreas. In a rat model of diabetes, transplants of tiny clusters of these cells restored disease symptoms.

According to study senior author Dr. Joe Zhou, a professor of regenerative medicine and a member of the Hartman Institute for Therapeutic Organ Regeneration at Weill Cornell Medicine, their study is a proof-of-concept analysis that gives a solid foundation for developing a treatment, based on a patient's cells, for type 1 diabetes and severe type 2 diabetes.

He added that it is not entirely remarkable that gastric stem cells can be so rapidly changed into beta-like insulin-secreting cells. The stomach produces hormone-secreting cells, and stomach cells and pancreatic cells are nearby at the embryonic stage of development.

Technical difficulties prevented attempts to replicate these results using human gastric stem cells, which can be readily extracted from patients during an outpatient procedure termed endoscopy. The researchers finally succeeded in the latest trial, which first author Dr. Xiaofeng Huang, a professor of molecular biology in medicine at Weill Cornell Medicine, directed.

The study was published in Nature Cell Biology.

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