NEW YORK, NY -- (Marketwired) -- 07/19/16 -- Worldwide the number of people living with diabetes has reached 422 million, and if the current trend continues, over 700 million people are expected to be living with diabetes by 2025. Diabetes has clearly become a healthcare crisis on a global scale, and PharmaCyte Biotech (OTCQB: PMCB) recently received some good news in the form of patent protection that will help the company do its part in bringing a treatment to tens of millions of these patients.
PharmaCyte recently learned from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USTPO) that it now has 20 years of patent protection in the United States for the "Melligen" cells that are a part of the company's therapy for Type 1 and insulin-dependent Type 2 diabetes. The timing is perfect because the same research that laid out the dramatic rise in the numbers of people affected by diabetes, also found that the global cost of diabetes has ballooned to $825-billion per year.
These staggering numbers come from the largest study ever done on diabetes levels across the globe. The study was published in the journal The Lancet and was led by scientists from Imperial College London, and involved Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, the World Health Organization, and nearly 500 researchers across the globe, and it incorporated data from 4.4 million adults in most of the world's countries.
PharmaCyte's therapy for diabetes is made up of its signature live-cell encapsulation technology Cell-in-a-Box®, which are pinhead-sized, porous capsules that are filled with insulin producing cells (Melligen cells). The capsules would protect the Melligen cells from destruction by the immune system and, in turn, would essentially create an "artificial pancreas" for type 1 diabetics and insulin-dependent type 2 diabetics that no longer produce their own insulin.
Prof. Ann. M Simpson and her colleagues at the University of Technology Sydney developed the Melligen cell line as an alternative to the transplantation of islets. According to Prof. Simpson and her team's research, which was published in the journal, Molecular Therapy -- Methods & Clinical Development, the cells are a human liver cell line that has been genetically engineered to reverse type 1 diabetes. (http://www.nature.com/articles/mtm201511)
The authors of the article note that, for the Melligen cells to be effective in treating Type 1 diabetes in humans where the insulin-producing β cells of the pancreas have been destroyed, it will be necessary to protect those cells from rejection by the body's immune system after they have been introduced into the body. The article points out that one way to protect the Melligen cells would be to encapsulate the cells in protective "cocoons" prior to being placed into a diabetic patient. If this is done, the authors believe that encapsulated Melligen cells may offer a "cure" for Type 1 diabetes.
It was PharmaCyte's Cell-in-a-Box® that got the attention of Prof. Simpson and her colleagues as the ideal encapsulation technology. In a 6-month study, pancreatic islet cells from pigs were encapsulated using the Cell-in-a-Box® capsules. Those capsules containing the islet cells were then implanted into live, diabetic rats. Within only a few days, the blood-sugar levels of the diabetic rats became normal and stayed at normal levels for the entire study.
When the capsules were removed from the rats at the end of the study, the islet cells inside the capsules were still alive and functioning. Pigs were chosen as the source for the pancreatic islet cells because biologically they are the closest to humans. Because islet cells from pigs ("foreign" donors) could be implanted in rats without the cells being rejected, this proves the islet cells inside PharmaCyte's Cell-in-a-Box® capsules were protected from attack by the rats' immune systems.
So now that the Melligen cells have received the patent protection necessary in both the United States and Europe, the marriage between the Cell-in-a-Box® capsules and the Melligen cells is in the hands of PharmaCyte's International Diabetes Consortium, which consists of world-renowned physicians and scientists from a number of countries around the world, all of whom share the same goal of developing a treatment for insulin-dependent diabetes.
Watch PharmaCyte's video on the development of its diabetes treatment at: www.PharmaCyte.com/diabetes.
About Stock Market Media Group
Stock Market Media Group is a Content Development IR firm offering a platform for corporate stories to unfold in the media with research reports, corporate videos, CEO interviews and feature news articles. This article was written based upon publicly available information. PharmaCyte Biotech has not endorsed this article, and Stock Market Media Group was not compensated for its production.
Stock Market Media Group may from time to time include our own opinions about the companies, their business, markets and opportunities in our articles. Any opinions we may offer about any of the companies we write about are solely our own, and are made in reliance upon our rights under the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, and are provided solely for the general opinionated discussion of our readers. Our opinions should not be considered to be complete, precise, accurate, or current investment advice, or construed or interpreted as research. Any investment decisions you may make concerning any of the securities we write about are solely your responsibility based on your own due diligence. Our publications are provided only as an informational aid, and as a starting point for doing additional independent research. We encourage you to invest carefully and read the investor information available at the web site of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission at: www.sec.gov, where you can also find all of PMCB's filings and disclosures. We also recommend, as a general rule, that before investing in any securities you consult with a professional financial planner or advisor, and you should conduct a complete and independent investigation before investing in any security after prudent consideration of all pertinent risks.
We are not a registered broker, dealer, analyst, or adviser. We hold no investment licenses and may not sell, offer to sell or offer to buy any security. Our publications about any of the companies we write about are not a recommendation to buy or sell a security.
For more information: www.stockmarketmediagroup.com.
Contact:
Stock Market Media Group
info@stockmarketmediagroup.com
Source: PharmaCyte Biotech, Inc.