Sam J. Piliero

A Plasma Extract with Erythropoietic Activity

Summary Administration to intact rats of an extract, prepared from the plasma of phenylhydrazine-treated rabbits, results in significant increases in peripheral red cell counts, hemoglobin concentrations, reticulocyte percentages, hematocrit values, and in the concentrations of nucleated erythrocytes within the marrow. The extract exerts no significant influence upon the total and differential white cell numbers or the sedimentation rates and red cell fragility values. The factor may be related to, or identical with, the circulating “hemopoietine” hypothesized to be the humoral mediator of anoxia, the fundamental erythrocytogenic stimulus.

Erythropoietic Stimulating Effects of Plasma Extracts from Anemic Human Subjects

Summary Boiled filtrates of acidified plasma obtained from 7 patients with Cooleys anemia and one of 2 patients with sickle cell anemia stimulated erythropoiesis in intact rats. A similarly prepared extract of urine from one of the Cooleys subjects was also active. Plasma filtrates from normal subjects and one patient with chronic hypoplastic anemia were inactive. The implications of these findings are discussed.

Attempts to Identify Site of Production of Circulating ‘Erythropoietin’

Summary Acidified boiled filtrates were prepared of plasma, liver, spleen, thymus. lung, brain, skeletal muscle, bone marrow and packed blood cells of rabbits made severely anemic by phenylhydrazine. When tested in normal rats, only the plasma extracts proved to be erythropoietiC., as evidenced by significant elevations in peripheral red cell, hema-tocrit and reticulocyte values as well as by a marked increase in the percentages of marrow nucleated erythrocytes. The site of formation of circulating ‘erythropoietin’ remains unidentified.

Erythropoietic Action of a Plasma Filtrate in Hypophysectomized Rats

Summary A filtrate of boiled plasma obtained from rabbits rendered severely anemic by phenylhydrazine was administered daily for 10 days to hypophysectomized rats. Significant increases occurred in peripheral red cell; hemoglobin, hematocrit and reticulocyte values. The bone marrows of these animals showed signs of intense erythroid cell hyperplasia.

The effects of low pressure and inanition on serum vitamin A levels and electrophoretic patterns in the adrenalectomized rat.

Summary Although adrenalectomy in the rat results in alterations in the serum protein levels, it appears that factors other than the adrenal may be involved in the stresses of starvation and lowered barometric pressures in the adrenalectomized rat. However, in the intact rat, these stresses are mediated through the adrenal gland.

The effects of low pressure on electrophoretic patterns in the endocrine-deficient rat

Abstract Pleuriglandular deficiences in the rat result in alterations in the serum protein levels. The stress of lowered barometric pressures on serum protein fractions appears to be mediated through the pituitary-adrenal axis.