Another promising step towards finding a cure for diabetes type 1 and type 2 has been made. Scientists have succeeded in transforming one type of cell into another meaning they turned ordinary pancreas cells into potential insulin sources. The newly created cells made insulin in diabetic mice, though the mices were not actually cured.

Scientists at the Stanford University School of Medicine are the ones responsible for the discovery. "Everybody's been wondering what process initiates type-1 diabetes," said Hugh McDevitt, MD, professor of microbiology and immunology and the study's senior author.

Now they’ve unveiled the mystery. It appears that the immune signal interferon-alpha is an early cause in a chain of events that sets sugar metabolism and makes patients dependent on insulin injections for the rest of their lives.

The researchers succeeded in using three genes of an ordinary virus in order to transform mouse exocrine cells, which make up about 95 percent of the pancreas, into the insulin-producing beta cells that are destroyed in type 1 (juvenile diabetes).

But before experiments begin in people, Dr. Douglas Melton a Howard Hughes Medical Institute researcher explained they want to find a way to transform cells without using a virus. Using viruses to treat people, he noted, is risky and disagrees with rules and principles approved by Food and Drug Administration experts.

The news was published today by the journal Nature and it also brought into discussion the possibility of also treating heart disease, strokes and many other medical problems that involve cell reprogramming by using this method.