Spider web inspired implantable "string" could control diabetes
Date: 3.1.2018
A team of researchers has developed a revolutionary new method for treating type 1 diabetes. Inspired by a spider's web, the team created an easily implantable nanoporous thread that can hold hundreds of thousands of insulin-producing islet cells and be easily removed when they need to come out.
Type 1 diabetes is characterized by the way the immune system destroys the body's insulin-producing cell clusters in the pancreas, called islets. For several years researchers have worked to find an effective way to transplant new, functioning insulin-producing islet cells into the body, but immune system rejection has been a major hurdle resulting in patients needed extreme immunosuppressive drugs.
This new method starts with a nanoporous polymer thread that is then covered with an alginate hydrogel which holds the insulin-producing islet cells. The hydrogel coating protects the islet cells from any immune system attack and the polymer thread allows the entire device to be easily implanted or removed through a simple laparoscopic surgical procedure.
Dubbed TRAFFIC (Thread-Reinforced Alginate Fiber For Islets enCapsulation), the team successfully demonstrated the thread in mouse models showing a one-inch length effectively reducing the animals' blood glucose levels to normal within two days of implantation. Ten-inch samples were also tested for retrievability in dogs with easy laparoscopic removal demonstrated one month after implantation.
