For decades, doctors have tried to replace the functions of beta cells that synthesize insulin and control the exchange of glucose in our body.

But injections of insulin are painful and impractical, and beta-cell transplantation is too complicated and risky due to the subsequent administration of immunosuppressants.

Now, the staff of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the University of North Carolina in Raleigh, USA, proposed a new option: a synthetic patch with live beta cells that secrete the right doses of insulin and help to avoid sudden changes in sugar.

The invention of American scientists used the advanced concept of "intelligent insulin patch," which in 2015 reported the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The patch is a piece of polymer with numerous thin needles on one side. If earlier the concept presupposed the filling of these needles with ready-made insulin bubbles, now on the back side of the patch are placed live insulin-producing cells that are integrated with the needles and produce the right amount of the hormone in response to the patient's needs.

Preclinical tests of a patch on animals with type 1 diabetes showed that the novelty responds quickly to fluctuations in sugar and is able to control its level in very large ranges. The test results were published in the edition Advanced Materials.

"This development provides a fundamentally new answer to the problem of beta-cell rejection, which for many years hinders the cure of diabetes. It's worth mentioning that we managed to build a kind of bridge between the physiological signals inside the body and the therapeutic cells outside it, adjusting their interaction, "says Zhen Gu, an inventor of plaster, a biomedical engineering teacher at the UNC / NC State Joint Bioengineering Faculty.

Recall that beta cells live in the pancreas and act as natural insulin factories.

In healthy people, they produce, store and release enough of the hormone to help glucose assimilate and regulate its blood content. But with diabetes, these cells are either damaged or overloaded, and therefore can not produce enough insulin.

Diabetes in the world already suffers about 387 million people, and by 2030 this figure can grow to 500 million. Diabetics are forced to monitor their sugar daily and take the right doses of drugs and / or insulin, and a mistake with a dose can cost them not only health but also life.

medbe. en.

Keywords:.