This study followed the progression of lead nephropathy in male Sprague-Dawley rats (E) administered lead acetate (0.5%) continuously in drinking water for periods ranging from 1 to 12 months. Control animals (C) were pair-fed. Observations included renal pathology by light and electron microscopy, wet and dry kidney weights, and glomerular filtration rate (GFR) to assess renal function. Urinary excretion of lead, the enzymes N-acetyl-beta-D-glucosaminidase (NAG) and glutathione-S-transferase (GST), and brush border antigens (BB50, CG9, and HF5) were utilized to explore possible markers of kidney injury. GFR was increased significantly after three months of lead exposure, but was decreased significantly after 12 months. Kidney wet weights were significantly greater in E than C from three months on. Kidney dry weight/wet weight ratio was constant up to three months, but decreased in E at 12 months. Glomerular diameters were normal at all time periods; the nephromegaly was related primarily to hypertrophy of proximal tubules. Lead inclusion bodies were found in nuclei of proximal convoluted tubules and pars recta at all times. Tubular atrophy and interstitial fibrosis first appeared at six months, and increased in severity thereafter. Brush borders of proximal tubules were disrupted at one and three months, but recovered thereafter. Focal and segmental glomerulosclerosis was observed in 2 of 10 rats at 12 months. Arteries and arterioles remained normal at all time periods. Urinary NAG was elevated in E above C after three months of lead exposure. However, urinary NAG in C also increased with age, obscuring changes in the 12 month E rats. GST was elevated after three months of lead administration in E, not without an attendant age-related increase in C rats. In three-month E rats, urinary brush border antigens were increased above C, but were decreased at six and 12 months, correlating with the morphologic changes in brush border. We conclude that a high dose of lead in rats may initially stimulate both renal cortical hypertrophy and an increase in GFR. Later, the adverse effects of lead on the tubulointerstitium predominate, and GFR falls. The urinary marker, NAG, was abnormal in the early stages of the disease, but age-related changes obscured its utility at later stages; urinary GST appeared to be a more consistent marker of injury.

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A patient with excessive industrial exposure to silicon and an elevated silicon content in his renal tissue was found to have a distinctive nephropathy, characterized pathologically by changes in the glomeruli and proximal tubules, and manifested clinically by albuminuria and hypertension. Proximal tubular function was intact. From a biochemical standpoint, this finding correlates with the demonstration in vitro that, in contrast to cadmium, a known cause of Fanconi syndrome, silicon does not inhibit renal cortical sodium-potassium-adenosine triphosphatase (Na-K-ATPase).

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Prostatic samples were surgically removed from 7 patients suffering from benign prostatic hypertrophy. High-speed supernatants (cytosol) containing 20-25 mg of protein/ml were prepared. Glycerol gradient ultracentrifugations were performed, using cytosol labeled at 0 C with 2-5 nM 3H-17beta-hydroxy-androstan-3-one (androstanolone or dihydrotestosterone) alone, or in the presence of 50-250-fold excess of androstanolone, estradiol, or androstane-3alpha, 17beta-diol (androstanediol). Two high-affinity saturable binding components were observed. One binding component was the androgen receptor. Its sedimentation coefficient was 8 S in low-salt medium. It had a high affinity for androstanolone. The binding of 3H-androstanolone was strongly completed by androstanolone itself, less by estradiol, and not by androstanediol. In one case, endogenous androstanolone found in the 8 S region of glycerol gradients was measured by radioimmunoassay, and it was calculated that more than 90% of the cytosol receptor binding sites might be occupied by this steroid while the total binding capacity of the 8 S receptor was estimated to approximate 2.6 pmol of androstanolone/g of prostate. No testosterone was found in the receptor fraction. The second binding component was attributable, at least in part, to the sex steroid-binding plasma protein (SBP), as indicated by its sedimentation coefficient (congruent to 4 S in low salt medium), its high affinity for androstanolone and androstanediol and its lower affinity for estradiol, and finally, its migration on polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis. In one instance, the concentration of the SBP-like protein in prostate cytosol was measured by equilibrium dialysis, and it was calculated that the binding capacity of the prostate SBP-like component corresponded to 4 pmol of androstanolone/g of prostate, a small (less than 5%) value with regard to SBP concentration in the plasma of the same patient. The blood contamination of the cytosol, as obtained from the measurement of hemoglobin, did not account for the amount of SBP found in the prostate sample. Since SBP-like protein is probably of plasma origin, to determine whether SBP was located in the extracellular space or inside the prostate cells, BPH slices from another patient were incubated in the presence of 3H-testosterone, the cytosol was prepared, and was fractionated by Sephadex G-150 column chromatography. The androstanolone/testosterone ratio in the receptor-containing peak was high (1.7), whereas in the incubation medium it was very low (0.08). In the peak containing the SBP-like protein, the ratio was 0.74, which may suggest that all or part had been exposed to the predominant androstanolone environment inside the prostatic cell.