Virgin Beta Cells Persist throughout Life at a Neogenic Niche within Pancreatic Islets.

ABSTRACT: Postnatal maintenance or regeneration of pancreatic beta cells is considered to occur exclusively via the replication of existing beta cells, but clinically meaningful restoration of human beta cell mass by proliferation has never been achieved. We discovered a population of immature beta cells that is present throughout life and forms from non-beta precursors at a specialized micro-environment or "neogenic niche" at the islet periphery. These cells express insulin, but lack other key beta cell markers, and are transcriptionally immature, incapable of sensing glucose, and unable to support calcium influx. They constitute an intermediate stage in the transdifferentiation of alpha cells to cells that are functionally indistinguishable from conventional beta cells. We thus identified a lifelo

SUBMITTER: van der Meulen T 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8586897 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature