Discriminant analysis of hematological and serum biochemical values in cynomolgus monkey (Macaca fascicularis) bred and reared under the indoor individually-caged conditions

Abstract

The data on hematological and serum biochemical properties of laboratory-bred cynomolgus monkeys (Macaca fascicularis) at different ages were analyzed by discriminant analysis. All the animals had been bred and reared under uniform environmental conditions at Tsukuba Primate Center for Medical Science, N.I.H., Japan. The items used were as follows: red blood cell count (RBC), hematocrit value (Ht), hemoglobin concentration (Hb), mean corpuscular volume (MCV), white blood cell count (WBC), glutamic oxaloacetic transaminase activity (GOT), glutamic pyruvic transaminase activity (GPT), total protein concentration (TP), albumin concentration (ALB), albumin-globulin ratio (A/G), blood urea nitrogen (BUN), glucose concentration (GLU), total cholesterol concentration (TCHO), free cholesterol concentration (FCHO), triglyceride concentration (TG) and alkaline phosphatase activity (ALP). In total, 1086 animals in 10 age groups were examined. Data analyses were done with respect to the difference of sex. Discrimination was possible by Mahalanobis' generalized distance between centroids of groups. In canonical discriminant analysis (discriminant analysis with reduction of dimensionality), age was highly correlated to the value of the first canonical variate. From the approximate relative value of the eigenvector of the first canonical variate, the most discriminant variables are WBC, TP, ALB, A/G, TCHO, FCHO, TG, and ALP. It can be concluded that periodic measurement of these 8 parameters is necessary and sufficient to monitor the physiological conditions of growing monkeys.