Reconstruction of the frequency distribution of A- and B-cell size in the pancreatic islets from several animal species--an important stereological operation in QMSOC.

The stereological algorithms for the conversion of the profile-size frequency distribution (PSFD) observed in histological section to the sphere-size frequency distribution (SSFD) in three-dimensional space was developed to a computer program and its practical application was described in this paper. The reconstructions of SSFD were based on the data of PSFD of A- and B-cells measured in sections of the pancreatic islets from ophiocephalus argus, toad, chicken, cat, rabbit and rat. The sizes of both profile and sphere were expressed by their caliper diameters. The experimental results showed that the patterns of SSFD of A- and B-cells from six animal species were somewhat different, and that all the peaks of them, however, occurred in the range from 6 to 12 microns in caliper diameter.