A. Espinar et al., HIGH-ACTIVITY OF RETINAL N-ACETYLTRANSFERASE IN THE EARLY DEVELOPMENTOF THE CHICK-EMBRYO - INDEPENDENCE OF LIGHTING CONDITIONS, Neuroscience letters, 179(1-2), 1994, pp. 103-106
In this paper, we studied the activities of N-acetyltranferase (NAT),
hydroxyindole-O-methyltranferase (HIOMT) and melatonin content in the
retina of chick embryo from the 7th day of embryonic age to hatching.
Our results confirm that the dependence on lighting conditions of NAT
activity and melatonin content appears to develop prior to hatching, a
s evidenced by differences observed when chick embryos were incubated
under constant darkness or constant light. Moreover, we found high NAT
activity during the first stages of the embryonic development up to 1
3th day of incubation. This activity, unlike late retinal NAT, is not
coupled to melatonin production and is not dependent on lighting condi
tions.