Scientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis working with diabetic mice have examined in unprecedented detail the immune cells long thought to be responsible for type 1 diabetes.

Researchers in Maine report a new explanation for the mysterious link between consumption of cows’ milk protein in infant formula early in life and an increased risk of later developing Type-1 diabetes. A protein in cow’s milk that triggers an unusual immune response appears to be the main culprit, they say. The study is scheduled for the June 6 issue of ACS’ monthly Journal of Proteome Research.

Researchers from 11 medical centers in the United States, Canada, Sweden, and Norway have begun testing new approaches to transplanting clusters of insulin-producing islets in adults with difficult-to-control type 1 diabetes.

For patients with type 1 diabetes, increased levels of uric acid in the blood may be an early sign of diabetic kidney disease—appearing before any significant change in urine albumin level, the standard screening test, reports a study in the May 2008 issue of the Clinical Journal of the American Society of Nephrology.

Scientists at the Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) have initiated a phase 1 clinical trial to reverse type 1 diabetes. The trial is exploring whether the promising results from the laboratory of Denise Faustman, MD, PhD, can be applied in human diabetes.

The pioneering work led by King’s College London and its partner trust King’s College Hospital, on islet transplantation to treat Type 1 diabetes, has been strengthened by the recent decision from the Department of Health to fund six new islet transplant centres around the country.

A team led by Dr Richard Smith, Consultant Senior Lecturer in Renal Medicine at North Bristol NHS Trust and the University of Bristol, will offer a pioneering new treatment for some patients with Type 1 diabetes, the Department of Health announced today.

The main regulators of the immune system, called CD4+Treg cells, are thought to be highly involved in a large range of immune diseases.

A research team led by Dr. Ciriaco A. Piccirillo of McGill University’s Department of Microbiology and Immunology has discovered that in some individuals, the specialized immunoregulatory T-cells that regulate the body’s autoimmune reactions may lose their effectiveness and become “lazy” over time, leading to the onset of type 1 diabetes.

A compound formed during insulin production and once dismissed as irrelevant in diabetes may be a key to preventing the complications that make Type 1 diabetes such a serious disease, according to an article scheduled for the Jan. 14 issue of Chemical & Engineering News, ACS’ weekly newsmagazine.

The Medical College of Georgia Center for Biotechnology and Genomic Medicine has been selected to isolate RNA and DNA from the blood of thousands of children involved in a worldwide study of the causes of type 1 diabetes.

Researchers at UC Davis Health System have discovered a novel pathway that results in increased inflammation of blood vessels in patients with type 1 diabetes. Their findings suggest that, with good diabetes control, this inflammation may be reduced, possibly resulting in a reduction of cardiovascular disease as well.