High-dose irradiation in the pig small intestine. Histoenzymology and electron microscopic study

The early and late effects of a single high-dose irradiation (100 rad) in the pig small intestine have been studied by histoenzymology and electron microscopy and related to some functional data. 1) The initial atrophy induced by the irradiation appears late (on the 6th day), compared to other species. This is due to the fairly long regeneration time of the villi epithelium in the pig. 2) The initial lesions are similar to those observed in different experimental models (nuclear alterations, karyolytic bodies, etc.). They particularly involve the crypts, and are specially focused in the undifferentiated cells of GS phase or mitosis, but also in goblet and Paneth's cells. 3) The villi regeneration, over on the 23rd day, is preceeded by an active mitotic phase which first renews the undifferentiated cells. This mitotic activity, reaching its highest value on the 16th day, goes on during the whole regeneration period itself. 4) At the beginning, this regeneration is denoted by the high esterase activity of the crypt collar. It appears in many goblet cells and also in some absorptive cells which show, at once, some of the enzymatic activities of the striated border. However, for a short period, lipid absorption is quantitatively reduced. This is connected with the temporary cell immaturity (up to the 20th day) and to the poorly developed rough endoplasmic reticulum and Golgi apparatus. 5) Further on, the persistence of a malabsorption syndrome (lipids, calcium) is not connected, for the main point, with modifications of the morphology or the cytology of the villi (in spite of the abnormally high number of goblet cells and the presence of few pathologic absorptive cells). It is, in fact, related to the persistence of an inflammatory state of the lamina propria associated with an exudative enteropathy. The meaning of this last finding is not clear: it could depend on a primary infectious state due to the modifications of the endoluminal intestinal flora, or, rather, on a secondary infection supported by the trophic epithelial disturbances induced by a continuous vascular dyshoria due to the irradiation.