Comparison of Magnesium Deficiency in the Rat and Mouse 1

Abstract

Summary

A comparative study has been made of the reactions of mice and rats subsisting on the same magnesium-deficient diet. Deficient young male rats developed the classical erythema, hyperirritability and tonic-clonic convulsions. While there was a high mortality with the convulsions, a good proportion recovered. Deficient male mice did not develop erythema or hyperirritability; they did convulse, but it was a single violent spasm wtih almost immediate death and rare survival. The deficient rats were either normocalcemic or hypercalcemia whereas the mice were hypocalcemic. There was a positive correlation between the plasma magnesium and calcium in the deficient mice. Although growth of mice receiving 5 mg% of magnesium in their diet was close to that of controls with 40 mg%, the plasma magnesium and calcium remained low for approximately 5 weeks.

Renal glomerular dysfunction and calcification did not occur in depleted animals in either species.