New hope for insulin cell transplant

Scientists working on pancreatic cell transplants are closer to overcoming the problem of immune rejection, according to new research. Scientists in the USA have transplanted genetically engineered cells into mice that lasted a few months before being rejected. However, they warn that routine transplants are still a long way off.

Cell transplantation therapy is hampered by rejection of the transplanted cells and the side effects of the drugs needed to suppress this rejection.

The researchers, from Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University engineered insulin-producing beta cells to include three genes from a virus capable of evading detection by the immune system.

Normally the transplanted cells are able to restore normal glucose control but are then destroyed by the body within a few days.

In diabetic mice injected with the modified cells, normal glucose control was achieved for up to three months.