Resumo

IKPEGBU, Ekele; NLEBEDUM, Uchenna; NNADOZIE, Okechukwu  e  AGBAKWURU, Isaiah. The Stomach of the Adult African Catfish (Clarias gariepinus, Siluriforme s: Clariidae) in Farm Conditions: A Morphological and Mucin Histochem istry Analysis. Rev. Fac. Cienc. Vet. [online]. 2014, vol.55, n.1, pp.4-10. ISSN 0258-6576.

The stomach of the farmed African catfish (Clarias gariepinus, Siluriformes: clariidae) was investigated in this study to establish its basic anatomy, as there is scanty information available on the literature. It produced to baseline data for further investigative research, help fish clinicians in pathology and aid nutritionists in feed management. After cropping from a commercial aquaculture, apparently healthy fish were immobilized and euthanized by using chloroform. The samples were dissected and slices of cardiac, fundic and pyloric stomach processed through routine histological procedures. Grossly, the stomach was J-shape. Cranial to the stomach was the oesophagus but no sphincter was seen separating them. Caudally, a pyloric sphincter separated the stomach from the proximal intestine. The stomach contained three regions cardiac, fundic and pyloric. The entire stomach surface was lined by a simple columnar epithelium containing mucin at the apical cytoplasm.  Only the cardiac and fundic regions contained gastric glands in the lamina propria, but the glands were more developed in the fundic region. The tunica muscularis contained smooth muscle cells in an inner circular and outer longitudinal orientation. Mucin histochemistry revealed the presence of only neutral mucin in the stomach. The results obtained in this study suggest that the absence of gastric glands in the pylorus may be an adaptation of this species to reduce the quantity of acid entering the proximal intestine; hence it might help the alkaline medium to maximize pancreatic enzyme actions in the proximal intestine. The presence of only neutral mucin in the stomach will act as a buffer to neutralize the high acidic stomach content. Neutral mucins are also associated with transport of macromolecules.

Palavras-chave : Culture; animal morphology; mucin; histochemistry; enzymes; animal glands; stomach; african catfish.

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