Biol. Pharm. Bull. 28(10) 1986—1988 (2005)

drug research, we have been examining the use of chick embryos and found that they may be superior for predicting the effects of drugs. Recently, we reported those thyroid abnormal models in chick embryos treated with thiamazol showed a similar reaction to digoxin, as in human. From these experiments, we expected that it might be able to produce an experimental diabetes model by the developing inhibition of the endocrine hormone in the pancreas of chick embryos. Streptozotocin (STZ) was first reported to have a specific diabetogenetic effect. And this agent has been widely used as a model of insulin-dependent diabetes destroying b-cells of pancreas in animal. However, it was not known STZ brings about any changes in pancreas of chick embryos at a late stage of incubation. In the present study, we determined the levels of blood glucose and serum insulin in developing embryos and examined to produce a model of diabetes in chick embryo by treatment of STZ. Furthermore, we evaluated the effects of human insulin, which used for diabetes therapy in insulin-dependent patients, using this diabetes model.