ESPE Abstracts (2015) 84 FC9.1

ESPE2015 Free Communications Beta cell disorders (6 abstracts)

Islet δ-Cells Contribute to the Pathobiology of Atypical Congenital Hyperinsulinism

Bing Han a , Siobahn Bourke a , Zainab Mohammad a, , Ross Craigie a , Mars Skae a , Edmund Cheeseman a , Indi Banerjee a , Karen Cosgrove a & Mark Dunne a


aUniversity of Manchester, Manchester, UK; bRoyal Manchester Children’s Hospital, Manchester, UK


Background: Atypical forms of congenital hyperinsulinism in infancy (CHI-A) represent a novel subgroup of patients who present later in the neonatal period; have poor responses to medical intervention; an unremarkable histopathology and no known genetic cause of disease.

Objective and hypotheses: To compare the expression profiles of insulin and somatostatin in islets from patients with CHI-A, diffuse CHI (CHI-D) and age-matched control tissue.

Methods: CHI tissues were obtained following pancreatectomy, and control tissue following autopsy. CHI-D patients were positive for defects in ABCC8; CHI-A was not associated with defects in CHI-associated genes. Insulin- (INS+) and somatostatin-expressing cells (SOM+) were identified by immunohistochemistry and quantified following digitization of paraffin-embedded tissue samples; Ki67 is a marker of cell proliferation and NKX2.2 is a marker of cell fate determination in islets.

Results: We examined n=380 islets from CHI-A and compared to control and CHI-D islets. In CHI-A, 49.5% of the islets (n=188) had a quiescent profile associated with condensed cytoplasm, nuclear crowding and reduced numbers of centrally-located INS+ cells. In control and CHI-D, >90% of islets were composed of >70% INS+ cells and <20% SOM+ cells (n=91). In contrast, >70% of quiescent CHI-A islets had less than 30% INS+ cells and >65% had more than 20% SOM+ cells; with 30% of islets composed of >50% δ-cells (n=20). Surprisingly, ‘quiescent islets’ had twofold higher rates of proliferation than unaffected islets from the same tissue, and >60% δ-cells were positive for NKX2.2; a transcription factor that was only present in a limited number of δ-cells in control islets.

Summary/conclusion: NKX2.2 maintains a β-cell phenotype and has a limited expression profile in δ-cells following birth. Marked increases in NKX2.2 expression in CHI-A δ-cells combined with increased numbers of SOM+ cells and rates of proliferation, strongly imply that an immature δ-cell profile contributes to the pathobiology of CHI.

Funding: National Institute of Health Sciences.

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