Morphometry of nuclear pore complexes in thyroid cells during hyperplasia and involution

Nuclear pore complexes were analyzed in freeze-fractured replicas of thyroid follicular cells of C3H mice in different physiological states. Thyroid stimulation induced a rapid and simultaneous increase of the nuclear surface and volume and of the total number of pore complexes. The numerical density (Na) of pore complexes increased at the 6th day of stimulation, but after that time the proportion of cells with an increased Na was always higher than the proportion of 3H-labelled nuclei. During thyroid involution, all the nuclear parameters, including the Na, returned to normal values. These results indicate that the total number of pore complexes and their Na are correlated with the cellular activity rather than with the cell cycle. They also suggest that 2 different mechanisms are involved in the generation of pore complexes: first, an addition of new membranes with a low density of pore complexes; later, a formation of new pore complexes in preexisting membranes. However, during involution, parts of the nuclear membranes and pore complexes in the remaining parts disappear synchronously. In freeze-fractured thyroid nuclear membranes, 2 neighbouring pore complexes were always separated by a distance of 105 nm. Clusters of pore complexes were not observed. A comparison of the distances between pore complexes and between randomly generated points never showed any significant differences indicating that pore complexes were randomly distributed.