Kaoru Okada, Japan has been granted the TTS-CTRMS Congress Scientific Award
Effect of human amniotic epithelial cells on intraportal islet transplantation
Kaoru Okada1, Kazuaki Tokodai1, Miyako Tanaka1, Tetsuro Hoshiai2, Masatoshi Saito3, Michiaki Unno1, Toshio Miki4, Takashi Kamei1, Masafumi Goto5.
1Department of Surgery, Tohoku University Graduate School of Medicine, Sendai, Japan; 2Department of Ofstetrics and Gynecology, Tohoku University Graduate School of Medicine, Sendai, Japan; 3Center for Perinatal and Neonatal Medicine, Tohoku University Hospital, Sendai, Japan; 4Department of Physiology, Nihon University School of Medicine, Tokyo, Japan; 5Division of Transplantation and Regenerative Medicine, Tohoku University Graduate School of Medicine, Sendai, Japan
Background: Islet transplantation is a promising option for treating type 1 diabetes. However, multiple transplantations are often required to achieve insulin withdrawal owing to limited islet volume and early islet damage after transplantation. In this study, we evaluated the effects of co-transplantation[A1] with human amniotic epithelial cells (hAECs) on an islet engraftment.
Method: Diabetes was induced in Lewis rats using streptozotocin 7[A2] –8 days before transplantation. Six-hundred IEQs[A3] syngeneic islets isolated from Lewis rats and 4000 IEQs allogeneic islets isolated from Wister/ST rats were transplanted either alone or mixed with 1 × 106 hAECs via the portal vein. Blood glucose levels were measured periodically after transplantation.
Results: In the syngeneic transplantation experiment, the blood glucose trends were significantly [A4] low in the co-transplantation group[A5] . In the allogeneic transplantation experiment, we did not observe long-term islet engraftment in both groups. However, the period of normalization for blood glucose levels was prolonged in the co-transplantation group compared with that in the alone islet group.
Conclusion: Although co-transplantation with hAECs improved early islet engraftment, the barrier of allogeneic rejection could not be overcome. The promotion mechanism of islet engraftment in syngeneic co-transplantation, improvement in short-term allogeneic islet engraftment, and the effects of hAECs on innate and acquired immune systems require further investigation.
