This advanced Teleost has a single mesentery-bound pancreatic endocrine organ that is separate from the exocrine pancreatic acini. The fish lose body weight and show slow skeletal growth and skeletal retardation which is measured by body length. They also show 50 percent reduction in cartilage. After these animals are given insulin, they respond like mammals. Another way replacement is shown in diabetes research is with laboratory rodents.
Rodents are beneficial in several ways.
Their low maintenance and their short generation time allow careful and controlled experiments to be conducted. Since laboratory rodents usually breed very easily, diabetes can be genetically established in a colony. This makes an excellent model for the study of genetic factors. Environmental factors such as pharmaceutical actions on diabetes mellitus are also easily observed. Rodents, whether rat, mouse, hamster, or guinea pigs, and the rabbit make suitable models for spontaneous diabetes.