Quantification of pancreatic islet distribution in situ in mice.
Tracing changes of specific cell populations in health and disease is an important goal of biomedical research. Precisely monitoring pancreatic beta-cell proliferation and islet growth is a challenging area of research. We have developed a method to capture the distribution of beta-cells in the intact pancreas of transgenic mice with fluorescence-tagged beta-cells with a macro written for ImageJ (rsb.info.nih.gov/ij/). Total beta-cell area and islet number and size distribution are quantified with reference to specific parameters and location for each islet and for small clusters of beta-cells. The entire distribution of islets can now be plotted in three dimensions, and the information from the distribution on the size and shape of each islet allows a quantitative and a qualitative comparison of changes in overall beta-cell area at a glance.
Kilimnik
German
G
Department of Medicine, The University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois 60637, USA.
Kim
Abraham
A
Jo
Junghyo
J
Miller
Kevin
K
Hara
Manami
M
D000818:Animals; D049452:Green Fluorescent Proteins / Q000096:biosynthesis / Q000737:chemistry / Q000235:genetics; D007091:Image Processing, Computer-Assisted / Q000379:methods*; D007150:Immunohistochemistry / Q000379:methods; D007328:Insulin / Q000235:genetics; D050417:Insulin-Secreting Cells / Q000166:cytology* / Q000378:metabolism; D051379:Mice; D008822:Mice, Transgenic; D011401:Promoter Regions, Genetic
C514817:Ins1 protein, mouse; D007328:Insulin; D049452:Green Fluorescent Proteins