Functional pathology of pancreatic islets: immunocytochemical exploration

Immunocytochemical methods have been used extensively in morphologic studies of pancreatic islets and have contributed a great deal to understanding morphofunctional relationships in various pathologic conditions. Many hitherto unknown changes in the cellular composition of islet tissue have been discovered using these methods. Appropriate and inappropriate secretory products have been identified in the pancreatic endocrine tumors. It is expected that immunocytochemical methods, together with electron microscopy, will provide additional important information about the pathophysiology of the pancreatic islets.