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news.Islet Sciences has signed a license agreement with Winthrop University Hospital to commercialize a Beta cell loss measurement technology in diabetes.
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The technology is complimentary to the early Beta cell destruction diagnostic that Islet Sciences has licensed last month.
Islet Sciences chairman and CEO John Steel said in the course of research conducted Dr. Eitan Akirav and his colleagues at Winthrop have developed a technology entitled-Method for Using Probe Based PCR Detection to Measure the Levels of Circulating Demethylated Beta Cell Derived DNA as a Measure of Beta Cell Loss in Diabetes.
"There has been a long-felt need for a method capable of accurately evaluating Beta cell death so as to improve disease diagnosis, allow for disease staging, and provide a better evaluation of clinical treatment efficacy,” Steel added.
”The method can identify Beta cell death before the onset of hyperglycemia and soon after the onset of T1D."
Winthrop University Hospital research scientist Eitan Akirav said the method provides a noninvasive approach to detect Beta cell death in vivo that may be used to track the progression of diabetes and guide its treatment.
”The method uses a stepwise detection and analysis of Beta cell and non-Beta cell derived insulin DNA,” Akirav added.
”The key principle behind the method is the existence of unique DNA methylation patterns in the Beta cells that are absent from other cells in the body."