Leukocyte activation, oxidant stress and red blood cell properties after acute, exhausting exercise in rats

Red blood cell (RBC) mechanical alterations and oxidative damage were inves tigated after an acute exhausting exercise in rats, together with the leuko cyte activation. The groups formed as follows. Control (C) (n = 9), group I (n = 9) and group II (n = 7) from which blood samples were collected 15 mi nutes and 24 hours respectively, after acute exercise. The rats were subjec ted to running at a speed of 17 m/min until exhaustion. The leukocyte phago cytic activity (LPA), RBC lipid peroxidation and RBC deformability were mea sured. LPA increased significantly after the exhausting exercise and prolon ged till 24 hours (p = 0.0168). RBC membrane lipid peroxidation was gradual ly increased till 24 hours (p = 0.0297) and there was a significant correla tion between LPA and RBC lipid peroxidation (r = 0.63, p = 0.015). There wa s a slight but significant decrease in mean corpusculer volume (MCV) (p = 0 .0467) and increase in mean corpusculer hemoglobin concentration (MCHC) (p = 0.0458) suggesting a cellular dehydratation after 24 hours. No significan t alteration was detected in RBC deformability, assessed by the Cell Transi t Analyzer (CTA) and thought that decreased MCV might have masked to determ ine the alterations in membrane mechanical properties in CTA. As a conclusi on the results imply that activated leukocytes might play role in the RBC d amage observed after exhausting exercise encouraging oxidative stress.