Effect of Tungstic Acid Extract of Normal Human Urine Upon Ovary of Rodents

Abstract

This is a histological report on the study of the ovaries of 20 rats and 24 mice which had been injected by Drs. Katzman and Doisy with their tungstic acid extract of normal human urine.

All of the animals were injected on the twenty-first day of life and upon the 2 following days with 1 cc. of extract in the case of the mice and 2 cc. in the case of the rats. The mice were killed on the twenty-fourth or twenty-fifth day of life and the rats on the twenty-eighth or twenty-ninth day. Six rats and 8 mice were injected with the extract from the urine of adult males, 4 rats and 6 mice with the extract from the urine of normal females, 2 rats and 2 mice with the urine extract of pre-pubertal boys, one rat with the urine extract from a 16-year-old boy, one rat and 2 mice with the urine extract of an elderly female past the menopause, 6 rats and 6 mice with the urine extract from female castrates receiving theelin therapy.

The common qualitative effects are: inhibition of follicular growth in most cases, marked conversion of granulosa and theca of small follicles into interstitial gland substance, cystic degeneration of many of the larger follicles, luteinization of some large follicles with the formation of pseudo-corpora suggesting those of ovulation, luteinization of granulosa and theca of many follicles, extensive atretic degeneration of follicles and congestion of vessels.

There is a wide quantitative variation in the degree of response produced by the extracts. The rats gave greater response than the mice but the latter were killed sooner after treatment. The extracts from the urine of female castrates receiving theelin therapy produced the greatest degree of change in the ovaries of the animals treated.