MACRO AND MICROSCOPICAL STUDIES ON THE PINEAL GLAND OF CAMEL WITH IMMUNOHISTOCHEMICAL LOCALIZATION TO PINEALOCYTES AND GLIA CELLS MARKERS.

This study was aimed to examine the anatomical, histological and immunohistochemical studies on the pineal gland of adult camel. Immunoperoxidase methods for the demonstration of synaptophys in and three glial antigens (vimentin, S-100 protein and glial fibrillary acidic protein).Tenpineal glands of adult camels were used in this study.The results revealed that the pineal gland of camel was light to dark brown and fusiform in shape. It was situated at the pineal recess caudal to the splenium of the corpus callosum and caudodorsal to the third ventricle and in front of the rostral colliculi.The pinealocytes and glia cells are the two types of parenchymal cells in addition to the presence of calcified concretions. The immunohistochemical findings showed that the synaptophysinimmuno reactive cells were observed with strong reaction in the periphery of the gland. The synaptophysinimmnoreactivity showed different degrees of density. The reaction was mainly observed in the perivascular spaces and the negative reaction was observed around the brain sand and in the interstitial cells. The positive reaction to vimentinimmunoreactivity was distributed throughout the gland, in the capsule and septa of the gland, in the endothelial cells of blood vessels, around the brain sand and the perivascular spaces forming network. The strong positive reaction to S-100 protein was detected especially in the stalk and the proximal region of the gland that is denser than vimentinimmunoreactivity. GFAP immunoreactive cells were mainly distributed in the proximal region of the gland and little reaction in the distal region.