Estrogen-concentrating neurophysin-containing hypothalamic magnocellular neurons in the vasopressin-deficient (Brattleboro) rat: a study combining steroid autoradiography and immunocytochemistry

Abstract

This report describes the distribution of neurophysin-containing, estradiol-concentrating neurons in a strain of rat which is congenitally unable to produce vasopressin and its associated neurophysin (the Brattleboro rat).In this strain of rat, all of the neurophysin-containing cells are oxytocin producing.The magnocellular neurons which produce vasopressin in the normal rat are present in their normal numbers and normal locations (Rhodes, C. H., J. I. Morrell, and D. W. Pfaff (1981) J. Comp.Neurol.198: 45-64) and can be identified as the neurophysin-negative magnocellular neurons.Estradiol-concentrating cell nuclei were observed in magnocellular neurons with neurophysincontaining cytoplasm as well as in magnocellular neurons lacking immunocytochemically detectable neurophysin.The majority of these neurons were found in the paraventricular nucleus (PVN), ventral and medial to its lateral subnucleus, and in the posterior subnucleus of the PVN.There were, in addition, many neurophysin-containing and neurophysin-lacking magnocellular neurons with nuclei which did not concentrate estradiol.Within the PVN, the majority of the neurophysinnegative, non-estradiol-concentrating neurons were in the lateral subnucleus, while the majority of the neurophysin-positive, non-estradiol-concentrating neurons were in the medial subnucleus.Comparison of the results of experiments using homozygous Brattleboro rats with the results of similar experiments using the (normal) parent strain Long-Evans rat suggests that, in the normal animals, there are both oxytocin-and vasopressin-producing neurons which concentrate estradiol.Comparison of these observations with published descriptions of the anatomical distribution of neurons which project to the medulla or spinal cord suggests that many of the oxytocin-.orvasopressin-containing, estrogen-concentrating neurons in the PVN send axons to regions regulating autonomic functions.

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