Disordered macrophage development in Hodgkin's disease shown by quantitative cytochemistry.

In order to investigate the disordered maturation of mononuclear phagocytes previously found in Hodgkin's disease, integrating microdensitometry was used to quantitate changes in seven cytochemical constituents (NADH dehydrogenase, succinate dehydrogenase, acid phosphatase, alpha-naphthyl butyrate esterase, DNA, RNA and glycogen) of developing macrophages from 19 patients and 19 normal subjects. Individual cells were studied at intervals over six days of suspension culture; the results were subjected to analysis of variance. In both groups, all the constituents studied except DNA showed highly significant increases over the period of culture. Consistently lower levels of alpha-naphthyl butyrate esterase (approximately 65%) and increased levels of glycogen were present in the Hodgkin's group. The results show that (1) maturational changes occur in the cytochemical constituents of developing macrophages of Hodgkin's disease, and (2) there are disturbances affecting the specific enzyme alpha-naphthyl butyrate esterase and glycogen that are likely to have profound implications for host defense mechanisms.