Histo-Physiological Studies on Chick Pancreas as Influenced by Feeding Raw Soybean Meal. ∗

Abstract

Summary

Pancreatic hypertrophy in chicks fed raw soybean meal is caused by an accumulation of zymogen material in the acinar cells. Failure of the pancreas to respond in the expected way to pilocarpine injection suggests that the raw soybean meal interferes in some way with the basic mehanism by which zymogen is released from the pancreatic cells. It therefore seems unlikely that the growth depression in chicks fed raw soybean could be due to excessive fecal loss of critical amino acids contained in pancreatic enzymes.