Adeturone protection of hemopoiesis in lethally irradiated mice and rats.

Experiments were carried out to investigate the possibility of providing chemical protection to blood forming organs and increasing animal survival rates in lethally irradiated H mice and Wistar rats. A 300 mg/kg dose of the radioprotective agent was injected intraperitoneally 15-30 min prior to irradiation with 8.0 Gy gamma rays. Recorded were 30-day survival rates and the state of hemopoiesis on days 3 and 10 postradiation as judged by spleen weight and total counts of spleno- and myelokaryocytes. At 8.0 Gy exposure was observed to cause severe spleen and bone-marrow hypoplasia on day 3 postradiation. Adeturone pretreatment provided slight protection to rat spleen and mouse bone marrow; by day 10, however, both animal species exhibited a vigorous proliferative response of nucleated cells in the bone marrow, which resulted in 75% survival rate among animals exposed to a lethal radiation dose.