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Updated: Jun 19, 2026

Direct Tracheal Instillation of Solutes into Mouse Lung
Published on: August 29, 2010
EFFECT OF INTRABRONCHIAL INSUFFLATION OF SOLUTIONS OF SOME INORGANIC SALTS
1Laboratories of The Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research.
Abstract:
Intrabronchial injections of isotonic as well as of hypotonic solutions of sodium chloride or even of distilled water cause no pulmonary lesions. Intrabronchial injections of mercuric chloride even in a dilution of 1:10,000 cause a marked pulmonary lesion. The lesion is not of an inflammatory character; it consists of congestion, formation of thrombi, and hemorrhage. Intrabronchial injections of hypertonic solutions of sodium chloride as well as of sodium sulfate cause, in most instances, no lesions whatsoever. In a smaller number of cases in which moderate lesions were present they may have been due either to a previous infection (distemper) or to some predisposing cause (winter months). Intrabronchial injection of magnesium salts apparently tends to cause moderate pulmonary lesions (bronchopneumonia). This seems especially true of magnesium sulfate.
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