title: Zinc administration prevents wasting in stressed mice.
abstract: Experimentally induced chronic stress can produce severe retardation on the physical development of young animals. Moreover, the chronic stress and its associated secondary malnutrition cause a variable depression on immunity, whose pathogenesis has been related to the excessive production of cytokines and glucocorticoids. When stressful stimuli are excessive, animals increment their anorexia and express a progressively installed wasting syndrome, associated with hypozincemia and susceptibility to infections with high mortality rate. In this work, chronically stressed mice were studied to observe the prophylactic effect of a zinc treatment on the evolution of both their malnutrition and their immune competence. Stress was induced in newborn Balb/c mice by intraperitoneal (IP) injections with heat-killed bacteria for 4 weeks. Following this inductive period, almost all the stressed mice showed a transient wasting syndrome characterized by anorexia, deficient gain of corporal weight, diarrhea, skin infection, reduced antibody response against antigens of red blood sheep cells, and a decreased proliferative response in their Con-A stimulated splenic lymphocytes. However, when the stressed mice received an additional IP treatment with zinc acetate, their clinical condition showed a significant improvement and their immunocompetence was similar to that exhibited by non-stressed mice from the control groups. The results suggest that zinc supplementation can ameliorate the effects of chronic stress on the growth, corporal weight, and immunocompetence of young mice.
authors.affiliation: Departamento de Biología, Facultad de Química, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, México, D.F.
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: García Tamayo
authors.forename: L I
authors.initials: LI
authors.lastname: Terrazas Valdés
authors.forename: N
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Malpica López
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D000831:Animals, Newborn; D001835:Body Weight / Q000187:drug effects; D002100:Cachexia / Q000209:etiology / Q000517:prevention & control*; D002908:Chronic Disease; D005260:Female; D007121:Immunocompetence / Q000187:drug effects; D008297:Male; D051379:Mice; D008807:Mice, Inbred BALB C; D009748:Nutrition Disorders / Q000209:etiology; D013203:Staphylococcal Infections / Q000150:complications; D013312:Stress, Physiological / Q000150:complications*; D015032:Zinc / Q000008:administration & dosage / Q000494:pharmacology / Q000627:therapeutic use*
chemical_list: D015032:Zinc