ACTION OF ASCORBIC ACID ON THE RESPONSE OF THE PITUITARY-ADRENAL AXIS IN THE GUINEA PIG

Abstract

PREVIOUS work indicated that ascorbic acid pretreatment to rats (Bacchus et al., 1951; Bacchus, 1951), and to mice (Bacchus and Altszuler, 1951) prevented the eosinopenia characteristic of the alarm reaction. Moreover, it was. demonstrated that the eosinophil response of the ascorbic acid-pretreated rat to epinephrin was similar to the response of the adrenalectomized rat to the same stressor. It was shown that the vitamin pretreatment did not block the eosinophil response to adrenocorticotrophin (Bacchus and Altszuler, 1951). Those data were interpreted as indicating that the vitamin acted by blocking the pituitary-adrenal axis at a pituitary or a pre-pituitary level, hence preventing the release of adrenocorticotrophin by epinephrin, and thereby blocking the increased release of corticosteroids from the adrenal cortex. It was recognized, however, that the blockage of response to epinephrin could be due to a specific ascorbic acid-epinephrin antagonism. This paper reports data on experiments which were planned to determine whether the vitamin possesses some specific anti-epinephrin action,