Effects of L-Arginine and L-NAME on Duodenal Histologic Parameters in Female Wistar Rats

introduction: nitric oxide (no), as a free radical, involves in several physiologic functions in gitract such as nerve impulse transmission and vascular tonicity regulation. nitric oxide synthase(nos) is the enzyme for the production of no from l-arginine which in turn inhibits by l-ngnitroargininemethyl ester (l-name). in the current work, we aimed to evaluate morphometricanalysis of duodenum under exposure of l-arginine and l-name in female wistar rats. methods: in this study, 5 groups (n=8) of 40 female rats (200-250 g, 8 weeks age) were chosen.normal saline (2 ml/kg), l-arginine (200 mg/kg), l-name (20 mg/kg) and l-arginine+lname(with the same doses) were administered intraperitoneal — for 3 days. after 2 weeks,samples were collected, stained with hematoxylin and eosin (h&e) and observed under lightmicroscopy. duodenal epithelial cell height and number, gland diameter, and submucosal andmuscular thicknesses were measured using optical software and analyzed by one-way anovafollowed by tukey’s post hoc test using spss-16. p≤ 0.05 was considered statistically significant. results: there were no significant changes in mean variables compared to the control group. conclusion: the results attested no noticeable changes in regard with the effects of l-arginineand l-name on duodenum parameters despite the major roles of no in gi tract.