A Single Treatment with IL-4 via Retrovirally Transduced Lymphocytes Partially Protects Against Diabetes in BioBreeding (BB) Rats

Context Type 1 diabetes mellitus is a T cell mediated autoimmune disease with no known methods of prevention. The BioBreeding rat is used as an animal model for the study of human Type 1 diabetes. In spite of a severe lymphopenia, these animals develop spontaneous diabetes at the age of 10-12 weeks. Objective To examine whether antiinflammatory gene therapy could be used to prevent autoimmune diabetes in the BioBreeding rat.