The Effect of X-Rays on Gonocytes in the Testis of the Rat

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Abstract
After treatment with X-rays (300 r) at 1 or 4 days of age, the majority of gonocytes in the testes of rats failed to divide and by 8 days of age these cells, together with their nuclei and nucleoli, had markedly increased in size. A number of gonocytes still present in the testes of normal rats at 8 days of age had also undergone this generalized enlargement. Determinations of the surface areas of germ cell nuclei confirmed the occurrence of the hypertrophy of gonocyte nuclei in normal and irradiated testes, and showed that the period during which gonocyte nuclei in irradiated testes became enlarged was the same irrespective of the age of irradiation. This period coincided with the one during which gonocytes in normal testes had begun to divide. These results led to the suggestion that irradiation, while suppressing the visible manifestations of mitosis, had not similarly affected the earlier synthetic phase, and that it was the products of this synthetic phase that had caused nuclei to enlarge. An inherent incapacity to complete the final stages of mitosis could likewise have resulted in the nuclear hypertrophy observed in some gonocytes in the testes of normal rats at 8 days of age.

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