Pancreatic Progenitor Cells Found in Mice

Belgian scientists, in an animal model, have identified a pancreatic progenitor cell with the capacity to generate new insulin-producing beta cells.

If the finding by researchers at Vrije University Brussels in mice holds for humans, the newly found progenitor cells might represent a target for therapeutic regeneration of beta cells in diabetes.

In people with type 1 diabetes, blood sugar rises due to a loss of the insulin-producing pancreatic beta cells. Insulin is a hormone that helps the body use glucose for energy.

One of the most interesting characteristics of these (adult) progenitor cells is that they are almost indistinguishable from embryonic progenitor cells, said Harry Heimberg at the university’s Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation Center.

Patricia Kilian, regeneration program director at the center, said the study provides novel insights that might provide therapeutic potential to regenerate beta cells in type 1 diabetes.

The most important challenge now is to extrapolate our findings to patients with diabetes, Heimberg said.

The study appears in the research journal Cell.