130 



NEUTRON EFFECTS ON ANIMALS 



RESULTS 



The control animals of Group A maintained or increased their weights 

 over the 12-month period. The dogs in Group B. except for dog B-7, 

 maintained their weights during irradiation and survived treatment satis- 

 factorily. Group C dogs, receiving large neutron doses daily, lost weight 

 rapidly following irradiation, and succumbed to the effect of the irradiation 

 6-8 days after the final exposure. 



The curves obtained after 6 hours of electrophoresis showed separation 

 of the plasmas into albumin, four a-globulins, two /3-globulins, fibrinogen, 

 and 7-globulin components. The percentage of each constituent, as well 

 as the albumin/globulin ratio, is presented in Table I. Because of the 



NEG- ARM 



PCS' ARM 



■fltb. 



DESC- 



ASC. 



Fig. 1. Electrophoresis pattern of the plasma of dog B-4 after prolonged low- 

 dosage neutron irradiation. 



probability that an appreciable eiror is introduced into the determination 

 of the values of individual constituents by the difficulty of dividing un- 

 equivocally, for measurement, the area due to a group of unsatisfactorily 

 resolved peaks, the total percentages of a-globulin and of /8-globulin are 

 also included in Table I. 



An examination of the figures given in Table I for Group A (normal) 

 and Group B (low dosage) dogs indicates that the distribution of the 

 components in the plasmas of the Group B dogs (excluding dog B-7) differs 

 little from the normal except for an increased fibrinogen content. The 

 table also shows the essential constancy of the albumin/globulin ratios 

 for the plasmas of the two groups. Dog B-7, which received considerably 

 larger total neutron irradiation and at a higher rate, showed a somewhat 



