INTERSTITIAL CELLS OF URODELE TESTIS 249 



nuclear changes; the hpoid droplets and fuchsinophile granules 

 present were as in neighboring cells or were reduced in numbers. 

 In several animals killed in April and May, however, the type 

 of degeneration observed is quite different, Many of the inter- 

 stitial cells now enlarge, as shown in figures 33 and 34, attaining 

 diameters of from 50 to 80yu ; in these the nucleus, rounded in the 

 normal type, becomes shrunken and flattened at one side of the 

 cell, frequently appearing very irregular in shape, and sometimes 

 staining with the acid rather than the basic stain. The lipoid 

 appears in much larger droplets than heretofore, and after fixation 

 in Bensley's fluid becomes noticeably more resistant to solution 

 than were the lipoids present in earlier stages or, for that matter,, 

 those now contained in adjacent interstitial cells not similarly 

 changed from the earlier type. The enlarged centrospheres seen 

 previously disappear from these cells; in a few cases what might 

 perhaps be a remnant of it could be seen as a mass, staining with 

 the basic stain, lying near the eccentric nucleus. There appear in 

 most of these cells masses of varying size and form which stain 

 with the acid fuchsin. These masses are derived from the gran- 

 ules seen previously. In many of the cells there can be no doubt 

 of this, for the mass (as in fig. 33) can be seen to be made up 

 of cytoplasm in which individual granules are yet distinguishable; 

 in one case the granules were grouped around what must formerly 

 have been the giant centrosphere, to judge by its size and stain- 

 ing reaction. In still other cases small blackened droplets were 

 included in the mass with the granules. In many cells, however, 

 the identity of the granules becomes lost and only solidly stain- 

 ing fuchsinophile globules or masses appear. All appearances 

 indicate that the cytoplasm has undergone partial solution, for 

 lipoid droplets and granule masses stand out in fixed material 

 with clear, unstainable spaces intervening, presenting quite a 

 different appearance from that of the normal cells adjacent to them 

 in the same section. Cells of this type do not long persist; they 

 are rarely found in the testis later than July. 



Through the numerous degenerations of the interstitial cells 

 as well as by their return to the stromal cell type, the number of 

 lipoid-containing cells is reduced, by July, to a few scattered 



THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF ANATOMY, VOL. 29, NO. 2 



