Comparative histology and histochemistry of the gastric glands of cats and dogs.

We performed histological and histochemical investigations on the gastric glands of cats and dogs. So-called cardiac glands in the cat and dog have a small number of the parietal cells and the PAS-positive glandular cells in the base of these glands contain fine pepsinogen granules. Consequently, we consider them as undifferentiated gastric glands, and can find no differences between these glands in both animals. The immature chief cells in the cat gastric glands are distributed not only in the glandular body but also in the base of the glands and contain sialomucin, and weak and strong acid mucopolysaccharides. The mature chief cells in cat and dog gastric glands contain weak and strong acid mucopolysaccharides. The gastric gland region of the dog is divided into clear and dark zones, and structural differences between the two zones are recognizable. Namely, the chief cells in the glandular base in the clear zone are somewhat undifferentiated, while the chief cells in the middle and lower parts of the glandular body and those in the glandular base in the dark zone are perfectly differentiated. The structure of the gastric glands in the fundic and greater and lesser curvature regions in the cat is very similar.