Cerebral blood flow and ultrastructural studies of the brain capillaries in the early state of hypertension in SHR+.
The 133Xe single bolus injection technique was used for measuring the cerebral blood flow (CBF) in spontaneously hypertensive (SHR) and normotensive rats. Their age was from 5 to 25 weeks and corresponded to the time before the initiation of the arterial blood pressure (BP) increase to the constant phase of hypertension. CBF in SHR 5 and 10 weeks of age was significantly higher than in all other groups being 155 +/- 7.2 and 151 +/- 9.3 ml/min/100 g, respectively. At 15 weeks of age the localization of the reactive products of ATP and CTP became scanty and spread over the endothelial cytoplasm. Further, at 25 weeks an enlarged number of empty pinocytic vesicles and astrocytic foot processes filled with flocculent electron dense material was found. These data suggest that the initial high CBF preceding the increase of BP can initiate the irreversible disorder of endothelial cells in brain capillaries.