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Insulin-Producing Cells Found In Fat, Liver & Bone Marrow

Posted: Friday, February 27, 2004

Possible way to generate insulin-producing cells from other tissues for the treatment of diabetes.

"In fact, the appearance of insulin-producing cells occurs in both type 1 (juvenile) and type 2 (adult-onset) diabetic mice," said Lawrence Chan, chief of the school's endocrinology section.

"The common denominator in all the animals is high blood sugar, not insulin-deficiency," he said. "High blood sugar causes these cells to produce insulin."

In the study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Chan found the source of the insulin-producing cells to be bone marrow, which has been identified as the origin of many different kinds of tissues in recent years.

He said he and his colleagues were surprised that only a brief three-day period of high blood glucose was sufficient to nudge the cells outside the pancreas to produce insulin.

If this inherent property of cells can be harnessed and augmented, Chan speculates, scientists can use it to generate insulin-producing cells from other tissues for the treatment of diabetes.

Source: Diabetes In Control.com.