Accelerating Regenerative Medicine Approaches to Type 1 Diabetes Through Direct Cell Reprogramming

Current treatment of type 1 diabetes mellitus (T1DM) depends on regular subcutaneous injections of exogenous insulin. Unfortunately, exogenous insulin therapy is associated with patient compliance issues and life-threatening hypoglycaemic events. Alternatively, recent convergences of biomaterial and regenerative medicine advances suggest transplantation of stem cell-derived beta cells as an “off-the-shelf” cell therapy treatment approach to T1DM, potentially providing long-term therapeutic benefits to patients, with minimal adverse effects.

However, derivation of mature beta cells from stem cells is a lengthy and expensive process requiring multiple cell purification steps. direct cell reprogramming of source stem cells to target beta cells, guided by analysis of gene regulatory networks using bioinformatic algorithms, offers a potential solution. This article explores regenerative approaches to resolve T1DM with a focus on how direct cell reprogramming could influence the field.