Retention of endocrine function by an insulin secreting pancreatic islet cell tumour from Syrian hamster through serial transplantation in nude mice

An insulin secreting islet cell tumor of the Syrian hamster was transplanted serially in the congenitally immune deficient nude mouse, in order to test the potential usefulness of this mouse mutant as a graft carrier of heterologous tumors with stable differentiated phenotypes. The incidence of tumor growth was very high, and the hamster tumor retained its functional and histologic characteristics during consecutive passages in these mice. It is concluded that nude mice may be useful carriers of differentiated tumors fron noninbred species including man, and for the isolation of cell lines from such tumors.