Location of central respiratory chemoreceptors in the developing tadpole

The location of central respiratory chemoreceptors in amphibian larvae may change as the central chemoreceptive function shifts from driving gill to driving lung ventilation during metamorphosis. We examined this possibility in the in vitro brain stem of the pre- and postmetamorphic Rana catesbeiana tadpole by microinjecting hypercapnic artificial cerebrospinal fluid (aCSF) while recording fictive lung ventilation. The rostral and caudal brain stem were separately explored systematically using injections of 11 nl of aCSF equilibrated with 100% CO2 that transiently acidified a 500-μm region, producing a maximum reduction in pH of 0.23 ± 0.06 at the site of injection. In postmetamorphic tadpoles, chemoreceptive sites were concentrated in the rostral compared with the caudal brain stem. No such segregation was observed in the premetamorphic tadpole. We conclude that, as in lung rhythmogenic function, respiratory chemosensitivity emerges rostrally in the amphibian brain stem during development.

Uptake of 125I-labelled prolactin by bullfrog kidney tubules: an autoradiographic study

The uptake of 125I-labelled ovine prolactin in the bullfrog kidney was studied by autoradiography. Five minutes after the intracardiac injection of 125I-labelled prolactin, no labelling was detected in the kidneys of premetamorphic tadpoles or in animals whose forelimbs had just emerged (climax tadpoles). After 15 min, a few isolated tubules were labelled in the premetamorphic tadpole kidneys and many kidney tubules were labelled in climax tadpoles. In the froglet kidneys, extensive labelling was seen by 5 min after injection, and only distal tubules seemed to be consistently unlabelled. The radioactive label was displaced by an excess of unlabelled ovine prolactin, but not by ovine growth hormone or bovine LH. These findings provide the first morphological demonstration of specific binding of prolactin by the nephric tubules of an amphibian. They show that the receptors, present in small numbers in the premetamorphic stage, proliferate during the later stages of metamorphosis. The change in receptor density involves both an increase in the number of tubules having receptors and in the density of receptors per tubule.