Separate autoantibodies to human pancreatic glucagon and somatostatin cells.

Autoantibodies reacting with discrete populations of cells in normal human pancreatic islets were found by immunofluorescence in 17 out of 1279 sera. A double immunofluorescence technique, with antisera to pancreatic glucagon, insulin, somatostatin, and human pancreatic polypeptide was used to show that 13 of the sera contained anitbodies reacting specifically with glucagon cells, while the other 4 reacted with somatostatin cells. These antibodies were directed against intracellular components and not against the hormones themselves. Both types of antibody occurred independently of the islet-cell antibodies which have been described in diabetes mellitus. These findings suggest selective damage to individual cell types in the pancreatic islets and raise the possibility of corresponding hormone deficiency syndromes.