Nanoparticle Vaccine Therapy for Diabetes and Petmeds

Filed in archive Did you know , Drugs, Vaccines and Therapeutics , Nanomedicine on April 7, 2010

© Navins

Scientists have discovered a new method of drug delivery for the treatment of diabetes. Using an innovative nanotechnology-based "vaccine", researchers were able to successfully restore normal blood sugar in mice with type 1 diabetes, and also slow the onset of diabetes in mice at risk for the disease.

The scientists coated nanoparticles with type 1 diabetes-relevant peptides, or protein fragments, that were bound to certain molecules that play a critical role in immune cell communication (called MHC molecules).

They found that, when administered to mice, the nanoparticle treatment expanded a type of regulatory T cell which suppressed the immune attack that destroys the insulin-producing beta cells of the pancreas. With the immune response that causes diabetes blocked, mice with type 1 diabetes regained normal blood sugars. And those that would have contracted the disease didn't.

They also tested the procedure using nanoparticles that were coated with molecules specific to human type 1 diabetes and it worked just as well. This means that nanoparticle vaccine therapy poses potentials not onyl in administering Petmeds, but as a viable method to prevent and reverse type 1 diabetes in humans.