Effect of pancreatic polypeptide-antiserum on bombesin-stimulated pancreatic exocrine secretion in dogs.

Bombesin is a potent stimulus of both pancreatic protein secretion and plasma pancreatic polypeptide (PP) release in dogs. Physiological plasma levels of PP have been shown to inhibit pancreatic exocrine secretion in dogs. We examined the question whether the concomitant release of PP exerts a suppressive action on the pancreatic exocrine response to bombesin in dogs by measuring pancreatic exocrine secretion with and without in vivo immunoneutralization of PP with a high affinity PP-antiserum. Bombesin was infused in a dose of 150 ng/kg.hr, resulting in a rise of plasma PP from 24 +/- 5 to 224 +/- 25 pM (p less than 0.01). Before this bombesin infusion, 7 ml of normal rabbit serum had been administered to the dogs (n = 8). At a later stage, the study was repeated after administration of 7 ml of PP-antiserum to the same animals. The bombesin induced increase in pancreatic exocrine secretion during administration of PP-antiserum (flow rate 24 +/- 10 ml/hr, protein output 1.35 +/- 0.43 g/hr, and bicarbonate output 3.25 +/- 1.42 mmol/hr) was not significantly different from that during control rabbit serum (flow rate 21 +/- 7 ml/hr, protein output 1.26 +/- 0.38 g/hr, and bicarbonate output 3.18 +/- 1.10 mmol/hr). It is therefore concluded that the pancreatic exocrine response to bombesin is not affected by the concomitant secretion of PP.