May have posted this, but this is very cool. “We can now generate insulin-producing cells that look and act a lot like the pancreatic beta cells you and I have in our bodies,” explains one of the team, microphysiologist Matthias Hebrok from the University of California San Francisco (UCSF).

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Although treatment of type 1 diabetes has come a long way since it was first described in Ancient Egypt, insulin injections and finger pricks are a daily part of life for many diabetics.

But researchers have just made a breakthrough that might one day make these technologies obsolete, by transforming human stem cells into functional insulin-producing cells (also known as beta cells) – at least in mice.

“We can now generate insulin-producing cells that look and act a lot like the pancreatic beta cells you and I have in our bodies,” explains one of the team, microphysiologist Matthias Hebrok from the University of California San Francisco (UCSF).

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Researchers in Australia are on the verge of discovering a universal flu vaccine — one which would be effective against all strains of the virus. When they do, we won’t have to take a new flu shot every year anymore. We’ll just get this one shot, and never more. It’s a finding that is being heralded as an “extraordinary breakthrough.” It could even end the flu and influenza epidemic once and for all.

The Epidemic

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