Mast Cells in Rat Pulmonary Pleura

Abstract

The aim of the present immunohistochemical study is to determine the metachromatic, tryptase and ghrelin positive mast cells in pulmonary pleura of male rats at different ages. The detection on serial sections of tryptase and ghrelin immunoreactivity with metachromasy allowed us to estimate the number of these three types of cells in lung pleura of different aged male rats. We revealed that the amount of toluidine blue positive mast cells (MCTB) in the lung pleura was significantly less than that of tryptase (MCTr) and ghrelin positive mast cells (GhrMC). The number of tryptase and ghrelin positive mast cells showed similar values. In the comparative study on serial sections, we observed that some MCTr and GhrMC did not show metachromasia. In pleura's subserous layer the percentage of MCTr and GhrMC with manifested metachromasia varies in the different age groups: 58-59% in 1-year-old, 42% in 3-month-old and 20% in 20-day-old animals.