[Morphologic and morphometric studies of the liver of the white rat during inadequate feeding and aflatoxin poisoning]. / Morfologicheskie i morfometricheskie issledoavniia pecheni belykh krys pri nedostatochnom pitanii i khronicheskoi aflatoksinovoi intoksikatsii.

The authors carried out morphological and morphometric studies of the liver of rats under malnutrition and chronic aflatoxin intoxication for 2 and 7 months. Malnourished animals demonstrated atrophic alterations. Animals exposed to aflatoxin B1 manifested severe dystrophic and necrobiotic alterations which did not depend on the nutrition regimen. In rats administered aflatoxin, blastomic processes were identified only at the 7th month. Whatever the diet.

Ultrastructural changes in the liver of rats treated with aflatoxin B1 and undernutrition.

White male Wistar rats were treated with Aflatoxin B1 for 2 months while on standard pellet food ad libitum or 80% undernutrition. Although each animal received 400 micrograms of AFB1 no cancer in the liver or elsewhere developed. Histologically the findings in the groups treated with the mycotoxin were the well known until now. Undernutrition led to atrophic and degenerative changes in the liver. Electronmicroscopically there were found marked changes in the nucleus, with microsegregation of the nucleolus; diminution and disorganization of endoplasmic reticulum and mitochondria; changes in the lysosomes, abundance of microbodies etc. with difference according to the intoxication, nutrition, or both of them. However, the combination of the 2 etiologic factors did not lead to a simple summation of the deleterious effect. At the same time, we do not have the right to claim a real "anticarcinogenic" action of undernutrition.