JERUSALEM, Nov. 19 (Xinhua) -- Israeli bio-pharmaceutical company Kadimastem announced on Tuesday a success in trials, on mice, of a drug for the treatment of diabetes based on pancreatic cells.
The product developed by the company, IsletRx, includes pancreatic cells in combination with a unique micro-encapsulation technology developed by the company.
According to the company's announcement, the results demonstrated a safe method of delivery of the drug, as well as efficacy manifested by prolonged normalized blood sugar levels in treated immunocompetent diabetic mice.
The company added that no complications related to the disease or treatment were observed throughout the 3-month trials, and all treated mice remained healthy.
This compares with a control group of untreated diabetic mice, which had acute hyperglycemia (high blood sugar levels), leading to mortality in the first 40 days of the trials.
The results also showed that integrating pancreatic cells with the micro-encapsulation technology kept the pancreatic cells protected from the immune response of the treated mice, without the need for drugs that suppress immune activity and could be toxic.
Following these results, the company is preparing for the clinical phase and talks with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
Kadimastem, based in the central city of Ness Ziona, develops industrial regenerative medicine therapies based on differentiated cells derived from human embryonic stem cells to treat neuro-degenerative diseases such as ALS and diabetes
The company was founded in 2009 by Michel Revel, professor of molecular genetics at the Weizmann Institute of Science in central Israel.
