Pregnant and weanling rats were fed liquid diets with
or without 30 percent of total kcal from ethanol and varying
levels of copper in order to determine if ethanol ingestion would
exaggerate a marginal copper status to an obvious copper
deficiency. Pregnant albino rats were fed either 0.75 or 3.75 mg
Cu/L throughout gestation and the first 15 days of lactation while
female weanling rats received 0.5 or 2.5 mg Cu/L for 5 weeks.
Ethanol consumption exaggerated a marginal copper status during
reproduction as evidenced by significant reductions in maternal
liver copper concentration and enzymatic activity of the copper
metalloprotein Copper-Zinc superoxide dismutase in offspring
liver. Ethanol had little or no effect upon copper status in
weanling rats. In addition, serum copper failed to reflect a
developing depletion of liver copper when ethanol was being consumed. Since it is known that the average American diet is
just adequate in copper content, and that copper balance is
difficult to achieve during times of increased metabolic demand,
pregnant subjects may be at a great risk to develop a copper
deficiency when ethanol is being consumed. This ethanol and
copper interaction, however, will likely go undetected if only
serum copper is used as an indicator of copper status. / Graduation date: 1989
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ORGSU/oai:ir.library.oregonstate.edu:1957/27126 |
| Date | 06 December 1988 |
| Creators | Astell, Rebecca L. |
| Contributors | Cerklewski, Florian L. |
| Source Sets | Oregon State University |
| Language | en_US |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis/Dissertation |
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