Histaminergic mediation of the response of rat skin to topical fluorides.

The topical application of sodium fluoride to abraded rat skin produced several morphological and biochemical effects. Related to the degranulation of dermal mast cells, skin histamine concentration was increased, fluorides were absorbed into the skin, and deposited mainly kin mitochondria. Dermal histamine binding was decreased for both H1 and H2 receptors with reduced binding sites, but epidermal adenyl cyclase was activated by fluorides. The response of the rat skin to fluorides involves a sequence of changes by which the potentiation of an inflammatory response also involves alterations in specific histamine receptors and a histamine-specific adenyl cyclase system.