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Crispr Offers New Hope for Treating Diabetes
Gene-edited pancreatic cells have been transplanted into a patient with type 1 diabetes for the first time. They produced insulin for months without the patient needing to take immunosuppressants.
Cells altered like this are said to be “hypoimmune,” explains Sonja Schrepfer, a professor at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in California and the scientific cofounder of Sana Biotechnology, the company that developed this treatment. Although the research marks a milestone in the search for treatments of type 1 diabetes, it’s important to note that the study involved one one participant, who received a low dose of cells for a short period—not enough for the patient to no longer need to control their blood sugar with injected insulin. An editorial by the journal Nature also says that some independent research groups have failed in their efforts to confirm that Sana’s method provides edited cells with the ability to evade the immune system.
Or read this on Wired
