Type I Diabetes is an autoimmune disease in which the body's T-cells attack the insulin-producing β cells, robbing the body of the insulin that it needs in order to regulate body sugar.

In Type II Diabetes, the body's tissues build up a resistance to its insulin. In response the pancreas produces more β cells. These cells eventually fail and the body is in the same need of insulin as presented in Type I.

Secondary complications of diabetes can be devastating and include blindness, renal failure, gangrene, coronary arterial disease, neurapathy, diabetic coma, and death.

Since embryonic stem cells have the ability to turn into any type of body cell, they can be used to create more β cells which is part of the solution. Although this has yet to be done in humans, it has been successfully tried in mice and monkeys. [3]

iPSCs could be also used for this purpose, injecting the patient's DNA and greatly reducing the risk of the immune system rejecting the new cells. [3]

Blood monocytes have been shown to de-differentiate under certain conditions (back to somatic stem cells) and then, under certain conditions, differentiate into liver-like cells that produce insulin. [3]

Research is also being done in the field of immune system replacement. Since in Type I Diabetes a person's immune system attacks the β cells, doctors can destroy the patient's immune system using radiation and then reinserting an entirely new immune system grown from the patient's stem cells. [4]