Abstract
The present study was initiated to clarify the interaction between PCB toxicity and riboflavin metabolism.
Weanling male rats of the Sprague Dawley strain received a diet supplemented with 0.1% PCB for a definite period, and the content of riboflavin and its nucleotides were determined.
It was found that the riboflavin content per gram liver of rats fed on the 0.1% PCB diet decreased significantly as compared with that of control animals. But the riboflavin content per liver per 100 gram body weight of rats fed on the 0.1% PCB diet increased significantly as compared with that of control animals. This is attributed to liver enlargement of the rats fed PCB.
Moreover, it was shown that the ratio of flavin-adeninedinucleotide, flavin-mononucleotide and free riboflavin content of the liver of rats fed on the 0.1% PCB diet was not significantly different from that of the control animals.
The above results seem to indicate that the influence of PCB on liver riboflavin metabolism in the rat was not so strong as in the case of CCl4, already reported by many investigators.
