Our Strategy to Prevent or Cure Type 1 Diabetes
The UMass diabetes team has uncovered bold new insights into T1D development. We are more likely to prevent or cure T1D when we fully understand the processes causing the disease, and can then rapidly test preventative strategies. The UMass diabetes team works with our new data & the knowledge acquired using our unique tools with a goal of finding the cure for diabetes.
The Problem: The UMass diabetes team has pursued the T1D cure for more than 20 years by working to understand the fundamental processes that cause diabetes. Evidence over the past 50 years has definitively shown that individuals with T1D have developed an immune response against their own insulin producing cells (called beta cells), which reside in the pancreas. That immune process, once triggered, takes months or even years to kill the insulin producing cells. Once sufficient beta cells have been destroyed, the individual is completely dependent upon injected insulin for the rest of their lives in order to survive.
The Scientific Hurdles:
- It has been extremely difficult to study the insulin producing cells in the pancreas of humans, where the disease process is occurring, since it is dangerous to biopsy the human pancreas.
- Immunologists do not understand immune processes that are so slow in pace.
- Mouse & rat models do not replicate human T1D. The human disease is unique and different than in experimental animals.
The Unique UMass Approach: Our scientists and collaborators have…
Developed a mouse that has no immune system of its own Human tissues can be transplanted into the mouse and those human tissues will survive and function as long as the mouse does (about 18 months). Some of these “humanized mice” have been genetically engineered so that their own insulin producing cells can be destroyed, making the mouse dependent on transplanted human beta cells. They serve as living test tubes to study human beta cell function and survival.
Established procedures for isolating and characterizing the immunecells that are attacking and killing the human beta cells.
Partnered with world-class stem cell biologists (both within UMass as well as at the Harvard Stem Cell Institute) to manufacture insulin producing human beta cells and other cells needed to study the process, including:
- Beta-like cells to make and secrete insulin
- Bone marrow cells that grow into the immune cells which attack beta cells
- Thymic epithelial cells, required to “educate” the human immune cells about which cells they should recognize as friend vs foe
Fostered trusting relationships with families afflicted with T1D who donate cells which are then manipulated into the cells described above
Perfected techniques for taking human pancreas tissuefrom deceased donors and isolating both the insulin producing cells and the immune cells for further study