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The relation of the islets of langerhans to the pancreatic acini under various conditions of secretory activity

1913; Royal Society; Volume: 86; Issue: 585 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1098/rspb.1913.0002

2053-9185

John Homans,

Pancreatic function and diabetes

The object of this research was to examine the relations of the islets of Langerhans to the pancreatic acini under the following conditions: first, at a time when the pancreatic tissue had been cut down to a very small amount, and second, when the gland had been exhausted by the action of secretin. Under the first of these conditions it was expected that, as the removal of the entire pancreas was inconsistent with life, the removal of all but a little might lead to the hypertrophy of one or both elements in the part remaining, and throw some light on the possibility of a change of acinous to islet tissue or the reverse. As a control to this procedure the pancreatic ducts were ligatured in one animal because the pancreatic acini rather than the islets are generally supposed to degenerate under these circumstances. In the second series of experiments—exhaustion of the gland by secretin—it was intended to test the assumption by Dale, Vincent and Thompson, and others, that this proceeding induces a change of acinous into islet tissue.