Date of Award:

5-1-2001

Document Type:

Dissertation

Degree Name:

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Department:

Biology

Committee Chair(s)

LeGrande C. Ellis

Committee

LeGrande C. Ellis

Committee

James A. Gessaman

Committee

Dale L. Barnard

Committee

Brett A. Adams

Committee

Kenneth L. White

Abstract

It was hypothesized that gonadotropic hormones and oxygen-derived free radicals affect histamine production in the testes. Luteinizing hormone, follicle stimulating hormone, prolactin, a combination of these three hormones, or saline (controls) were injected for either 4 or 7 days into seven wild-type (demi) and seven dark male mink per group. All mink were euthanized with carbon monoxide. Their testes were removed and frozen on dry ice. The histamine content was analyzed using radioimmunoassay. The control wild-type mink injected for either 4 or 7 days had histamine values of 8.15 μg/g and 7.56 μg/g, respectively. In wild-type mink, there was no significant change in histamine concentration for any of the injected groups. In dark mink, the control value for mink injected for 4 days was 7.73 μg/g. FSH and the combination-injected mink were not significantly different. LH and prolactin injected mink displayed significantly different values of 11.5 μg/g and 10.8 μg/g, respectively. With dark mink injected for 7 days, the control group level of histamine was 8.66 μg/g, while the histamine concentrations for LH and prolactin-injected mink were significantly elevated at 13.5 μg/g and 12.8 μg/g, respectively. The histamine concentrations for the combination-injected group were also elevated at 10.9 μg/g. Hydrogen peroxide as a free radical was applied in vitro to mink testicular homogenates at volumes of 0, 1, 20, 50, and 100 μl. The control value was 7.51 μg/g of tissue. Samples with 50 and 100 μl differed significantly from the control group, with values of 8.70 μg/g and 9.83 μg/g, respectively. The addition of two units of xanthine oxidase to testicular homogenates increased histamine content from 8.06 μg/g to 11.9 μg/g, which was significantly different. These data show that LH and prolactin increased the histamine content of testes from dark mink only, and that free radicals increase histamine production of testicular homogenates in vitro and perhaps in the testes in vitro. These mechanisms are thought to be involved in the etiology of autoimmune orchitis that exists in dark mink.

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