Intestinal lactase activity in the suckling rat: influence of hypophysectomy and thyroidectomy.
Intestinal lactase activity, which is high in the infant rat intestine but falls to a low level by the end of the third week, fails to decline in animals hypophysectomized at the age of 6 days. Treating these animals with thyroxine lowers lactase activity to the control level at 24 days, but cortisone is only partly effective. Thyroidectomy at 6 days also results in persistence of high lactase activity; thyroxine again is more effective than cortisone in reducing activity. The thyroid gland appears to play a previously unsuspected role in intestinal maturation.
D000367:Age Factors; D000818:Animals; D000831:Animals, Newborn; D003348:Cortisone / Q000494:pharmacology; D005696:Galactosidases / Q000378:metabolism*; D007016:Hypophysectomy; D007422:Intestines / Q000201:enzymology*; D007583:Jejunum / Q000201:enzymology; D010902:Pituitary Gland / Q000502:physiology*; D051381:Rats; D013961:Thyroid Gland / Q000502:physiology*; D013965:Thyroidectomy; D013974:Thyroxine / Q000494:pharmacology
D005696:Galactosidases; D013974:Thyroxine; D003348:Cortisone