Pancreatic islet xenotransplantation: the potential for tolerance induction

Pancreatic islet transplantation can correct the disordered glucose metabol ism of IDDM, but its widespread application will probably need non-human so urce of islets. Immunosuppression presently available to control rejection of xenografts is unsustainable clinically. However, experiments in rodents suggest that xenogeneic islets can survive without continuing immunosuppres sion and experiments in large outbred species suggest that clinically appli cable protocols are possible.