Pancreatic Islet Survival and Engraftment Is Promoted by Culture on Functionalized Spider Silk Matrices.
General transplantations of pancreatic islets as treatment for insulin-dependent diabetes have so far been of limited success. The challenges of providing viable islets in large quantities for transplantation have proven to be extensive. In this study presented in PLOS ONE, mouse as well as human islets were applied onto different functionalized spider silk matrices which improved the long-term maintenance and function of the islets. The study also suggests that the InSight in vivo technology applied in this study, could be useful for screening of potential therapeutic treatments as well as for development of novel transplantation strategies.