WASHINGTON, Jun 14 - Dr. Peter Thule, of the Atlanta Veterans Affairs Medical Center and Emory University in Atlanta, has transfected the insulin gene into diabetic hepatocytes via an adenovirus vector improving blood sugars to "not quite normal, but they are impressively better than [if the diabetic] rats [were] given insulin [by injection]." Gene expression apparently was turned-on by glucose and turned off by insulin [affecting the promoter element.]
Dr. Thule
speculated that clinical trials could be 1 to 2 years
away.
[MCV group is now the second to
have transfected the insulin gene into hepatocytes]
