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and V. MATULEVIIUS

Institute of Endocrinology, Bucharest, Romania

(Received 20 September 1977)

We have previously reported that the pineal gland of the mammalian foetus, which comprises mainly specialized secretory ependymal cells (Anderson, 1965), synthesizes the nonapeptide arginine-vasotocin (AVT; Pavel, Dorcescu, Petrescu-Holban & Ghinea, 1973; Pavel, Goldstein, Ghinea & Calb, 1977). However, in contrast with the foetal pineal gland, the predominant cell type in the pineal gland of the adult mammal is the parenchymal cell or pinealocyte (Quay, 1965); there is a marked reduction in the number of ependymal cells and they are restricted to the pineal recess (Anderson, 1965), which shows the same secretory characteristics as the subcommissural organ (Palkovits, 1965). Since we have postulated the ependymal origin of mammalian AVT (Pavel, 1971; Pavel et al. 1973; Pavel, 1975; Pavel et al. 1977), it seemed worthwhile to investigate the synthesis of AVT in the adult pineal gland in order to elucidate, if only