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The Influence of Zinc-Deprivation on the Mast Cell Population of the Bone Marrow and Other Tissues^{1, 2,}

Department of Anatomy, Faculty of Medicine, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, Canada, K1N 9A9

Five groups consisting of 72 young male Sprague-Dawley rats were submitted to dietary Zn deprivation (1 ppm versus 50 ppm for controls) for periods of 1 to 6 weeks with ad libitum or pair feeding. After 1 week of Zn deficiency, growth was almost arrested, the oesophageal epithelium became hyperplastic. After 3 weeks, the mast cell population of the bone marrow increased rapidly in ad libitum fed and also in pair-fed rats. Between 3 and 5 weeks, the thickness of the proximal epiphyseal plate of the tibia decreased by 33%. Contrary to Mg-deficient rats, Zn-deprived rats maintained their skin and thyroid mast cell populations after 5 weeks. The mast cell population of the metaphysis of the tibia increased from 1 to 5 weeks in both Zn-deficient and Zn-supplemented rats. In the Zn-deprived rats however, the mast cell population became increasingly higher than in the Zn-supplemented, from 1 to 5 weeks. In the pair-fed group, the mast cell population of the marrow was also significantly higher after 3 weeks. The special response of the bone marrow cells to Zn-depletion points to this tissue as a renewal site. Zinc may also be a maturation factor for mast cells.

KEY WORDS: • zinc • mast cells • bone marrow

¹ Presented in part at the 90th Annual Meeting of the American Association of Anatomists, Detroit, Michigan, May 2 to 5, 1977.

² Supported by the Medical Research Council of Canada (Grant MT 799).

Manuscript received 29 July 1977.