Five lucky diabetic beagles have been cured of their canine type 1 diabetes using gene therapy, according to research published in the February issue of Diabetes.

Researchers from Barcelona's Universitat Autonoma previously found the therapy effective in treating mice, but this is the first time gene therapy -- when a patient's DNA is supplemented or changed to treat a disease -- has proven successful in curing diabetes in large animals. Gene therapy encodes a functional gene to replace a mutated one, or inserts DNA that produces a therapeutic protein to treat a disease.

In this case, the dogs were injected with two extra genes that together form a "glucose sensor" that can regulate glucose uptake and reduce excessive glucose levels in the blood.