Histological and physiological studies on the intestine of the rat exposed to solutions of Myrj 52 and PEG 2000

Abstract The closed gut segment technique was used to investigate the effects of various concentrations of polyoxyethylene (40) stearate (Myrj 52) and Polyethylene glycol 2000 (PEG 2000) solutions on the histology of the intestinal mucosa and on fluid movements across the intestinal barrier. The results show that the higher concentrations of Myrj 52 and PEG 2000 induced cell loss and epithelial damage, and in addition solutions of PEG 2000 caused an unequal loss of enterocytes and goblet cells. Cell loss is likely to be a transient phenomena, with normal cell proliferation in the intestinal crypt being responsible for the restoration of villus architecture. Solutions of Myrj 52 caused little movement of fluid across the intestinal barrier but PEG 2000 at similar concentrations induced a considerable fluid loss from the mucosa to the lumen. The mechanism of this effect appears to be related to the anomalous osmotic behaviour of the PEG 2000 solutions, which dramatically changes the normal osmotic gradient across the intestinal barrier.