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In what could be a breakthrough in diabetes research, investigators at the Harvard Stem Cell Institute have discovered a hormone with the ability to produce beta cells--the insulin-producing cells found in the pancreas that are lost in diabetes--that could treat Type 2 diabetes more effectively. The hormone also has the potential to treat Type 1 diabetes , or juvenile diabetes.
In mice, researchers found that the hormone betatrophin increases production of insulin-secreting pancreatic beta cells at up to 30 times the normal rate. Not only that, but the new beta cells generated from the betatrophin only produce insulin when the body needs them--a property that could help regulate insulin in the body and thereby offset many of the complications associated...