More islet cell research to share with you today:
We’ve been covering quite a few companies working hard at finding ways to protect islets from immune system attack. First we profiled Cerco Medical, which is also the subject of a documentary film, and a couple of weeks ago we checked in with ViaCyte, of San Diego. Both of those companies are working with stem cells, but today’s company, Canada’s Sernova, is kicking it old school…
We were familiar with the company ViaCyte through its former identity as NovoCell, when we reported that they’d managed to successfully control diabetes in mice using embryonic stem cells back in 2008.
Last year, they changed their name, but their two-part mission remained the same: first, to create fully functioning beta cells (the specific kind of islet cells that make insulin and amylin) from embryonic stem cells, and then to find a way to combat…
Filmmakers Lisa Hepner and her husband, Guy Mossman, are on a mission to bring the story of diabetes and the quest to find a cure to the silver screen. For Lisa, it’s not just professional — it’s personal. Lisa was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes 20 years ago while in college and has worked for the past 15 years producing documentaries for the likes of Discovery Channel, TLC, MTV and PBS. Now she wants to…
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Dan Hurley, award-winning journalist and author of the new book Diabetes Rising is turning out to have some controversial views. He certainly thinks about Type 1 diabetes — which he’s lived with himself for 34 years — in different terms than I do; he’s very focused on causes and prevention, while I’m just trying to work out how to live with this thing. When I approached Dan to write a piece here at the ‘Mine…
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