2021.9 CTS News: Academia Sinica Discovers Reversal Mechanism, Diabetes is Poised to Be Curable!
[translated from Chinese]
戢靜璇 黃建熒 Reporter / Taipei
A team from Academia Sinica's Agricultural Biotechnology Center has discovered a gene that, if overexpressed, leads to the failure of pancreatic beta-cells. Consequently, late-stage diabetic patients must rely solely on insulin injections to slow the progression of the disease. However, now that the mechanism of this gene is understood, they have developed its inhibitor target drug. This means that patients in the early-to-mid stages of diabetes now have a chance to use this drug to prevent the worsening of diabetes and inhibit islet failure.
Wounds that are difficult to heal and ultimately require amputation are among the most painful and distressing aspects for diabetic patients. Some patients also suffer from vascular thrombosis, leading to blackened feet that necessitate amputation. Now, Academia Sinica has made a new discovery. Dr. Wen-Ching Yang, Deputy Director of the Agricultural Biotechnology Research Center at Academia Sinica, stated: "PDIA4 is mainly expressed in the pancreatic beta-cells. The inhibitor can lower the enzyme's activity, which protects the beta-cells."
Experiments showed that inhibiting the PDIA4 gene in mice not only alleviates islet failure and increases insulin secretion but also demonstrated that after continuous drug use for 18 weeks, the mice did not show deterioration even after stopping the medication for one year. However, the drug is not effective for every diabetic patient. Dr. Yang further explained: "It must be used in the early-to-mid stages of diabetes. For late-stage patients, beta-cells are significantly reduced, which is why we must administer insulin. If we wait until the beta-cells are depleted, using this drug will not be able to achieve the effect of reversing diabetes."
This new drug is scheduled to undergo a Phase I clinical trial at National Taiwan University Hospital early next year. If the trial is successful, it is expected to be launched in seven years, marking the first targeted drug for diabetes treatment since 1921. Nevertheless, to prevent diabetes, early detection and treatment remain crucial, as deterioration to the late stage is currently irreversible.