The neonatal porcine lung: ultrastructural morphology and postnatal development of the terminal airways and alveolar region.

Morphology and postnatal development of the porcine lung are described in animals ranging in age from newborn through 60 days. Standardized fixation was accomplished by intratracheal instillation of glutaraldehyde under constant pressure. Light microscopic, scanning, and transmission electron microscopic investigations revealed that the porcine lung follows the common architecture of mammalian lungs, but has certain peculiarities as well: intravascular macrophages, ultrastructurally similar to Kupffer cells, are attached to endothelial cells in pulmonary capillaries and are involved in erythrophagocytosis during the first postnatal weeks. Type II pneumocytes of newborn pigs exhibit signs of cell activation, mainly complex nuclear bodies in the cell nuclei. At the same time high levels of 17-hydroxycorticosteroids are observed in the newborn blood plasma. Terminal airways of the porcine lung are nonalveolarized and are, therefore, of purely conductive function. At birth the porcine lung exhibits a high degree of maturity, and thick-walled primary saccules, as described in newborn rodents, are not seen. Septa appear straight and smooth, owing to rare ramification. Septal buds are discernible, and two capillary networks visible on both sides of septal cross sections are seen. Further subdivision of the airspaces occurs in the first two postnatal weeks. Precociousness and fast postnatal growth of the porcine species are assumed to be the reason of this advanced degree of lung maturity at birth and the following rapid pulmonary development.