Pigs Arrive in Bio-Secure Facility

U.S. scientists say they’ve taken an important step toward finding a cure for diabetes with the opening of a bio-secure facility for medical-grade pigs.

Researchers with the Spring Point Project, an organization created to expedite the widespread availability of islet tissue for diabetes care, say the new $6.2 million, 21,000-square-foot Islet Resource Facility in Minneapolis will be dedicated to finding and funding the cure for diabetes.

Populating the Islet Resource Facility marks a major milestone in our ability to offer islet transplants to all patients with diabetes who meet medical criteria, said Dr. Bernhard Hering, scientific director of the Diabetes Institute for Immunology & Transplantation at the University of Minnesota, which may run pre-clinical and clinical trials with Spring Point Project.

Human islet cell transplants have reversed diabetes in 90 percent of our recipients, said Hering. However, the shortage of human donor organs greatly limits the applicability of islet transplants. Pig islets will solve this demand issue and are at the forefront of a far-reaching cure for patients with diabetes.

Pancreatic islet cells from the approximately 100 pathogen-free pigs at the facility will be used for transplantation into diabetes patients in clinical trials.