Reduction of the nitrogen-retaining effect of growth hormone in normal and adrenalectomized pantothenic acid-deficient rats.

Abstract

introduction CONSIDERABLE data are available indicating that rats subjected to certain nutritional deficiencies are unresponsive to the growth-promoting properties of injected growth hormone. For example, rats given growth hormone while on a vitamin A-deficient diet fail to increase in body weight, have an accelerated onset of deficiency symptoms, and show decreased survival (Margitay-Becht and Wallner, 1937; Ershoff and Deuel, 1945). More recently it has been observed that exogenous growth hormone aggravates the acrodynia of pyridoxine deficiency and fails to produce nitrogen retention in pyridoxine-deficient rats (Beare, Beaton, Smith and McHenry, 1953). Rats deficient in choline (Hall and Bieri, 1953), or in the unsaturated fatty acids (Deuel, Greenberg, Calbert, Savage and Fukui, 1950) failed to increase in body weight when given growth hormone. Gordan, Bennett, Li and Evans (1947) demonstrated that injection of growth hormone in rats maintained on a low protein diet (6% casein) resulted neither in pr...