In vitro transdifferentiation of adult pancreatic acinar cells into insulin-expressing cells

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• 作者：Song ; Ki-Ho ; Ko ; Seung Hyun ; Ahn ; Yu-Bae ; Yoo ; Soon-Jib ; Chin ; Hyung-min ; Kaneto ; Hideaki ; Yoon ; Kun-Ho ; et. al.
• 关键词：Acinar cell ; β ; Cell ; Islet ; Transdifferentiation ; Islet transplantation
• 刊名：Biochemical and Biophysical Research Communications
• 出版年：2004
• 出版时间：April 16, 2004
• 年：2004
• 卷：316
• 期：4
• 页码：1094-1100
• 全文大小：1.10 M

文摘

Despite a recent breakthrough in human islet transplantation for treating diabetes mellitus, the limited availability of insulin-producing tissue is still a major obstacle. Here, we studied whether adult pancreatic acinar cells have the potential to transdifferentiate into islet or β cells. Pancreatic acini were isolated from 7- to 8-weeks-old male Sprague–Dawley rats and cultured in suspension. Within 1 week, most of the acinar cells lost amylase expression and converted to cells with a duct cell phenotype. Insulin-positive cells were also observed, mainly at the periphery of the acini-derived spheroids. Insulin gene and protein expression was increased. Presence of a few insulin-positive cells coexpressing cytokeratins suggests that a spontaneous acinar to ductal cell transdifferentiation process was further going on towards β cells. This study provides the first evidence that adult pancreatic acinar cells could be differentiated into insulin-expressing cells in vitro.