As part of a major advance for medicine, a 42 -year -old man suffering from type 1 diabetes for 37 years has received a genetically modified islet cell transplant from a 60 -year donor, all without having recourse to immunosuppressive drugs. This result, published in an article in the New England Journal of Medicine, describes a new procedure that could one day allow you to cure the disease.
Before the test, the patient had an “undetectable” insulin production. For the test, the researchers used the editing of CRISPR-CAS12B genes to immunize them against the patient’s immune system. To do this, they deleted the HLA proteins, which act as foreign identifiers, then added the CD47, a protein that acts as a signal “do not eat me”. By means of 17 separate injections, doctors introduced around 80 million cells modified in the patient’s system.
For observation purposes, the research team said it had included modified and partially modified cells. The patient’s immune system immediately attacked and annihilated these cells. On the other hand, its immune system completely ignored the hypoimmune cells, which survived and produced insulin during the 12 weeks of the study.
Peptide C measurements carried out during the study confirmed that the cells of the Langerhans arelets were well integrated and produced insulin. Although it is still a study of proof of concept, it offers the hope of an alternative path for the treatment of type 1 diabetes, which avoids the patient frequent insulin injections and immunosuppressants who have harmful side effects.
