Regional Density of Perfused Capillaries and Cerebral Blood Flow in Untreated Short-Term and Long-Term Streptozotocin Diabetes

Publisher Website
Google Scholar
Abstract
The regional density of perfused cerebral capillaries (rDPC) and regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF) were measured in 12 selected brain regions in rats after 3 and 20 weeks of streptozotocin-induced diabetes and in control groups. After 3 weeks of diabetes, both rCBF and rDPC were unchanged in the diabetic group compared to the control group. A diabetes duration of 20 weeks causing bilateral cataracts induced a significant (p < 0.05) reduction in rCBF in two structures in the visual system compared to the control group (visual cortex: 105 versus 129 ml 100 g−1 min−1; lateral geniculate body: 106 versus 128 ml 100 g−1 min−1) and in the pontine reticular nucleus (82 versus 128 ml 100 g−1 min−1), whereas rDPC remained unchanged. A highly significant correlation between rCBF and rDPC was found in both control groups ( r = 0.8, p < 0.005) whereas the correlation was more scattered in the diabetic groups ( r = 0.6, p < 0.05). The present results show that during chronic diabetes, a reduction of rCBF does not affect the number of perfused capillaries.