The composition and amount of vitamin A stored in the retinal pigment epithelium and choroid (RPE-Ch) was evaluated in postmortem donor eyes from a patient with retinitis pigmentosa that was probably inherited by an autosomal recessive mode. Additionally, the soluble proteins in the neural retina and RPE-Ch cytosols and interphotoreceptor matrix were examined collectively for the presence of in...

Photon capture by a rhodopsin pigment molecule induces 11-cis to all-trans isomerization of its retinaldehyde chromophore. To restore light sensitivity, the all-trans-retinaldehyde must be chemically re-isomerized by an enzyme pathway called the visual cycle. Rpe65, an abundant protein in retinal pigment epithelial (RPE) cells and a homolog of beta-carotene dioxygenase, appears to play a role i...

Polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs), a class of additive flame retardants, are temporally increasing in wildlife tissues and capable of disrupting normal endocrine function. We determined whether in ovo and post-hatch exposure of captive American kestrels (Falco sparverius) to environmentally relevant PBDEs alter thyroid, retinol, and oxidative stress measures. Control eggs were injected wit...

Experiments were conducted to determine whether nursling rats immunized with tetanus toxoid (TT) are able to produce a specific antibody response and whether oral treatment with retinyl palmitate, concurrent with immunization, affects the magnitude of the anti-TT response. When rats aged 8-15 d and nursed by vitamin A-sufficient dams were immunized with TT, no primary anti-TT immunoglobulin (Ig...

Newborns have limited reserve supplies of vitamin A. Infants with chronic cholestasis are in a precarious nutritional state because of their limited ability to build these stores even though the vitamin is present in their diet. In this study, we investigated liver concentrations of vitamin A in 30 children with extrahepatic biliary atresia. We demonstrate that correction of the deficiency occu...

Several epidemiological reports and experimental investigations have suggested a preventive role for folic acid in the etiology of cervical cancer. The effect of p.o. folic acid supplementation on the natural history of cervical intraepithelial neoplasia (CIN) was evaluated in a multiinstitutional prospective, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial. Three hundred thirty-one women wi...

The main function of the skin is to protect body from negative environmental influences. physical barrier permeability mainly represented by stratum corneum; however, other layers epidermis and dermis are its important components. mechanical strength provided intercellular contacts in structural proteins dermis. chemical-biological includes lipids, acids, natural moisturizing factor antimicrobi...

Isotope dilution is currently the most accurate technique in humans to determine vitamin A status and bioavailability/bioconversion of provitamin A carotenoids such as β-carotene. However, limits of MS detection, coupled with extensive isolation procedures, have hindered investigations of physiologically-relevant doses of stable isotopes in large intervention trials. Here, a sensitive liquid ch...

Retinas and livers were studied with histochemical methods for catalase combined with light and electron microscopy, following intramuscular injections of C57 black mice with retinyl acetate or retinyl palmitate in total doses of 0.9 to 6.7 X 10(6) I.U./kg. body weight. There were clear, dose-related increases in the numbers and sizes of vitamin A--storing lipid droplets in the stellate cells o...