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Summary This real-time video is the first ever showing the progression of diabetes on a cellular level.
Researchers at the La Jolla Institute in California have devised a method to observe the real-time cellular processes that cause diabetes. Utilizing advanced microscopy techniques and live video, the development allows scientists to watch the deadly diseases progression while creating new treatments. Diabetes is one of the worlds leading causes of blindness, heart disease, and kidney failure.Using a powerful two-photon microscope and fluorescent dye, diabetes researcher, Dr. Matthias Von Herrath was able to capture video of t-cells attacking insulin producing beta cells in the pancreas of a live mouse.You see some of the cells getting out the vessel and making these ant-like tracks inside the pancreas, all a random type of movement. Here you can see the islets, the big green blobs that you see here that contain the beta cells. Once these little green cells reach the islets, just like the ants reach the food they have found their target, and they will begin destroying the beta cells.Beta cells produce insulin - a hormone that transfers sugar from the blood stream to cells that then convert it into energy. In a diabetic person, the immune system attacks those cells, choking off insulin production.
