Reversing gastric mucosal alterations during ethanol-induced chronic gastritis in rats by oral administration of Opuntia ficus-indica mucilage

Figure 1 Representative micrographs of gastric mucosa of rats with gastritis and treated with mucilage. A: control animals; B: animals subjected to gastritis (T0); C: animals 24 h after ethanol withdrawal. In micrographs B and C, the presence of PMN infiltrate is shown by large arrows in the insets; D: histological profile of the spontaneous recovery of gastric mucosa 72 h after ethanol withdrawal (arrows: PMN); E: histological profile corresponding to similar conditions after treated with mucilage (3 doses).

Figure 2 Total phospholipids and cholesterol in plasma membranes of mucilage-treated rats with gastritis (A) and the phosphatidylcholine (PC)/phosphatidylethanolamine (PE) methylation ratio (B) and cholesterol (chol)/total phospholipids (total phosp) ratio (C). In all cases mean ± SE, n = 5. Animals subjected to gastritis are represented by empty symbols while those treated with mucilage are represented by solid symbols. ^bP < 0.01 vs healthy animal control. ^dP < 0.01 vs animals with gastritis not treated with mucilage.

Figure 3 Effects of gastritis and mucilage from O. ficus-indica on cytoplasmic specific ADH and LDH activities. The results are expressed as mean ± SE of five individual observations per experimental group for the alcohol (ADH) and lactate (LDH) dehydrogenases in the cytosolic fraction. Statistical significance is shown in Figure 2.

Figure 4 Activity of 5’-nucleotidase and its relation with the cholesterol/ phospholipid ratio in plasma membranes of mucilage-treated rats with gastritis. Left panel represents the mean ± SE of five individual observations per experimental group for 5’-nucleotidase activity. The correlation between activity of this enzyme and the PC/PE ratio or the cholesterol (chol)/phospholipid (phos) ratio is shown in the right panel of Figure 2. Statistical significance is indicated in the left panel of Figure 2.