Aiming at assessing compensatory lung growth after trilobectomy in rats, 3 groups of animals (control, thoracotomy and trilobectomy) were studied over 3 time intervals (7, 30 and 180 days post-operation). Protein, DNA and RNA contents in each lung were evaluated. The study of the left lung protein content reveals that compensatory growth ceased by day 30, whereas it continued to occur in the cranial lobe as long as 180 days post-operation. The lung DNA content in trilobectomized animals remained smaller than in the animals of the other groups demonstrating that compensatory growth was not brought about by hyperplasia. The lung RNA content in trilobectomized animals increased similarly to the lung protein content, demonstrating that the cells of the lung tissue must have had an increase in volume as no significant increase in their number occurred, as shown by the analysis of the lung DNA content. Therefore, it may be concluded that, in our experiment with adult animals, compensatory lung growth after trilobectomy in rats occurred due to an increase in the lung protein content and RNA content, suggesting a cellular volume increase (hypertrophy) and a probable increase in the intralveolar septs rather than an important cell multiplication
Compensatory Growth; Lung; Protein Content; DNA Content; RNA Content; Trilobectomy
