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Infection of DBA/2N male mice with encephalomyocarditis virus resulted in a diabeteslike syndrome characterized by hyperglycemia, glycosuria, hypoinsulinemia, polydipsia, and polyphagia. Blood glucose levels were elevated within 4 days after infection and reached a maximum mean level of 320 mg/100 ml within 12 days. Approximately 60–80% of the animals developed a transient hyperglycemia while 10–15% of the animals remained hyperglycemic for well over 6 mo. The remaining animals failed to become hyperglycemic but many had abnormal glucose tolerance curves. Hyperglycemia was most pronounced when animals were allowed free access to food, and the incidence of byperglycemia was related both to the strain and sex of the animals, with few females developing hyperglycemia. The amount of immunoreactive insulin in the plasma of infected hyperglycemic mice was significantly lower than in appropriate controls, and injection of exogenous insulin resulted in a rapid drop in the blood glucose levels. Despite the fact that certain animals were hyperglycemic for many months, virus could not be recovered from the pancreas after the first 10 days of the infection.

The seroepidemiology of the defective adenovirus-associated satellite viruses was studied by use of a neutralization test that has been shown to be much more sensitive than the complement-fixation (CF) test. Less than 25% of the subjects in any age group were positive for any type of satellite virus CF antibody. The neutralization test revealed serological evidence of satellite infection in almost 80% of the subjects in some age groups. Studies of geometric mean antibody titers by neutralization showed that antibody against type 1 and the type 2-3 complex reached peak levels at 2 to 3 years of age; antibody against types 2 and 3 reached mean titers of 500 to 800, whereas mean antibody levels of only 200 were found for type 1. Type 4 antibodies were rarely noted in human sera. In a companion study in monkeys, monospecific responses to types 1 and 4 were found only in rhesus and green monkey sera, respectively. These data suggest that the type 2-3 complex may be the only naturally occurring satellite serotype which infects man and that antibodies noted against types 1 and 4 may be the result of cross-reactions. No satellite viruses were isolated from throat or rectal swabs of 100 children between 6 months and 3 years of age. However, the patterns of adenovirus and enterovirus isolations from these specimens were typical of previous studies in this laboratory.