BioCentury
ARTICLE | Targets & Mechanisms

Tyrosine kinase inhibitors for diabetes

December 18, 2008 8:00 AM UTC

Since the kinase inhibitors Gleevec imatinib from Novartis AG and Sutent sunitinib from Pfizer Inc. were approved to treat various cancer indications, academics have been looking to take advantage of the off-target promiscuity of these drugs by aiming them at diseases outside of oncology, including rheumatoid arthritis, psoriasis and Crohn's disease. Indeed, studies have already shown that patients with chronic myeloid leukemia and type 2 diabetes experienced improvements in the latter condition when treated with Gleevec.1

Now, researchers at the University of California, San Franciscoreport that tyrosine kinase inhibitors also could have utility in type 1 diabetes. The team, led by Jeffrey Bluestone, director of the UCSF Diabetes Center, found that Gleevec decreased insulitis and full-blown diabetes in both prediabetic and new-onset diabetic mice compared with what was seen in mice that received oil control solution.2...