Singapore, April 30 -- Researchers at The University of Queensland (UQ), Australia have dosed 5 participants in the first clinical trial of a potentially revolutionary immunotherapy drug to treat Type 1 diabetes.

Professor Ranjeny Thomas AM from UQ's Frazer Institute has led the development of a targeted immunotherapy drug, ASITI-201, which has been designed to rebalance the body's immune response to protect insulin-producing pancreatic cells.

"In people with Type 1 diabetes, the immune system starts to recognise pancreatic cells as something it needs to attack, and right now the only available treatment is insulin replacement," Professor Thomas said.

"We've taken a new approach and developed ASITI-201 using a protein from the pancreas...