The influence of chronic hyperhomocysteinemia on the structure and immune processes of the spleen in young rats

Abstract

Homocysteine is a sulfur-containing amino acid that is an intermediate product of methionine metabolism. Entering the body with products of animal origin, methionine undergoes a number of biochemical transformations. Hyperhomocysteinemia has a negative effect on the body, causing damage to all organs and systems and leading to disruption of homeostasis. The study aims to study the characteristics of changes in the structure and immune processes of the spleen of young rats with chronic hyperhomocysteinemia. Experiments were performed on 22 white male rats. The animals were divided into control and experimental groups (11 individuals in each group) during the experiment. Chronic hyperhomocysteinemia was achieved by administering D, L-thiolactone homocysteine hydrochloride to experimental group animals at a dose of 200 mg/kg of body weight intragastrically in a 1 % starch gel solution once a day for eight weeks. After the end of the experimental simulation of chronic hyperhomocysteinemia, the animals were removed from the experiment by anaesthetising by decapitation and using thiopental anaesthesia. Histological preparations were studied using an SEO SСAN light microscope. Experimental modelling of chronic hyperhomocysteinemia in young rats was not accompanied by significant morphological changes in the stroma and red pulp of the spleen. T-cell periarterial sheaths and B-cell nodules in animals from the experimental group underwent changes. B-cell proliferation leads to growth within the white pulp, expansion of the marginal zones, which become more blurred and infiltration of these cells into the red pulp. Evaluation of the red pulp in the spleen of young rats from the experimental group showed a particular expansion in the venous sinuses, which may be a sign of reaction to the influence of homocysteine and slight swelling of these vessels. The number of T-cells in young animals in the periarterial cuffs is slightly reduced, which can be explained by the increasing activity of macrophages. However, T-cells also infiltrated the red pulp. Such penetration of white blood cells into the red pulp is accompanied by the expansion and “washing out” of the marginal zones of lymph nodes. Thus, the increased homocysteine level significantly potentiated proliferation and partially inhibited apoptosis in T-lymphocytes but did not directly affect dormant T-cells.