Genetic transformation technology brings good news to terminally ill patients

Stem cell transplantation will no longer be the choice to cure the complicated diseases Gene research at Harvard University provides more options for the treatment of various diseases Recently, scientists from Harvard University injected specific proteins directly into mice suffering from diabetes, and successfully transformed ordinary pancreatic cells into insulin producing β cells - which means that in the future, medical staff can use genetic transformation technology to make the human body repair the damage or regenerate healthy tissues, and cure the difficult and miscellaneous diseases Successful transformation of cells According to the research report published in the journal Nature recently, scientists activated three dormant genes that control cell variation Within ten days, pancreatic cells stopped their normal function of producing enzymes to promote food digestion, and instead began to produce insulin like beta cells to regulate blood sugar The process is like loading a new operating system and upgrading a personal computer to an apple   Doug Melton, co-author of the study and co director of the Harvard Stem Cell Institute, said the method could also be used to produce motor neuron cells, cure patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or use them in patients with heart disease to produce cardiomyocytes in short Can produce a variety of key cells, repair a variety of diseases caused by the body damage Melton says researchers can successfully switch cells and repair damaged cells as long as their neighbors remain healthy The technology has been successful in laboratory mice, but it will take two to three years to apply it to humans The reason is that using this technology to treat other diseases besides diabetes requires a series of cumbersome procedures: first, find out the correct combination of key genes, and then study the best Zui scheme to start them This process, known as direct reprogramming, relies on the fact that all cells contain a complete set of DNA genes In the process of cell growth, some unknown program leads to the opening and closing of different genes, thus producing muscle fibers, neurons, cardiomyocytes and other cells When a cell is destroyed, it's not easy to fill in the gaps they leave New technologies avoid ethical issues Still, Patricia Kilian, head of regenerative therapy research at the juveniles diabetes research foundation, believes the technology avoids complex ethical issues that have previously been controversial in embryonic stem cell research Over the past decade, scientists have been working on stem cells to find solutions to a variety of incurable diseases, because they can naturally generate new tissues that can then be implanted in patients Among them, embryonic hepatocytes are the key Given the right chemical stimulation, it can grow into any kind of cell - although the mystery remains unsolved The reason why embryonic stem cells are controversial is that they come from mature embryos damaged in the middle of the process In recent months, researchers have found a new alternative: just activate four genes that are active in the early stages of cell formation, and then the adult cells can return to the embryonic state What Harvard scientists are thinking about is whether they can find a shortcut to allow cells to transform directly between different kinds of cells, rather than returning to the embryonic state They chose diabetes, one of the key areas of stem cell research Patients with type 1 diabetes need new beta cells to produce insulin because their original beta cells have been destroyed by the immune system Insulin is essential for the metabolism of sugar Otherwise, the patient must measure the blood glucose level every few hours and inject insulin five times a day When it was decided to use "direct gene recombination," Melton's team targeted nine key genes, which are more active in mature beta cells and their close relatives The researchers used specific proteins, known as transcription factors, to turn genes on or off They tried every possible combination to determine the conditions necessary to produce insulin cells Zui finally found that three critical gene combinations can be activated by the proteins Ngn3, PDX1 and MafA They then injected the mice with a virus that specifically infects the exocrine cells of the pancreas, and the protein carried by the virus just activated the latent gene Three days later, the cells began to produce a small amount of insulin Ten days later, 20% of exocrine cells lost their original cobblestone shape, showing a spindle like β cell According to the experimental report, their insulin production mechanism is basically the same as that of normal β cells To test their ability to cure, the researchers removed beta cells from dozens of mice, causing them to develop type I diabetes As long as the above three proteins are injected, the fasting blood glucose level of the subjects will be significantly improved, far more than that of the other group taking placebo Studies have shown that genetic transformation is faster and more effective than stem cell therapy Even reserved crian hailed the study as "eye-catching" and "surprising": the immune system would not be immune to rejection because there was no need for a cell transplant In addition, according to Konrad hochedlinger, a scientist at Harvard Stem Cell Research Institute, immature stem cells are at risk of cancer, so genetic transformation technology is safer He said that more "direct gene recombination" aimed at curing diseases and repairing injuries was to be expected But the first task for researchers is to make a combination of proteins, tissues and genes for different diseases.