Organs from Primates

At first, it seemed reasonable to look toward nonhuman primates, such as chimpanzees and baboons, as organ donors. With experience. 

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Danscher G, Horsted-Bindslev P, Rungby J. 1990. Traces of mercury in organs from primates with amalgam fdlings. Exp Mol Pathol 52(3) 291-299. 

L-Ascorbic acid, better known as vitamin C, has the simplest chemical structure of all the vitamins (Figure 18.30). It is widely distributed in the animal and plant kingdoms, and only a few vertebrates—humans and other primates, guinea pigs, fruit-eating bats, certain birds, and some fish (rainbow trout, carp, and Coho salmon, for example)—are unable to synthesize it. In all these organisms, the inability to synthesize ascorbic acid stems from a lack of a liver enzyme, L-gulono-y-lactone oxidase. 

Carotenoids are also present in animals, including humans, where they are selectively absorbed from diet (Furr and Clark 1997). Because of their hydrophobic nature, carotenoids are located either in the lipid bilayer portion of membranes or form complexes with specific proteins, usually associated with membranes. In animals and humans, dietary carotenoids are transported in blood plasma as complexes with lipoproteins (Krinsky et al. 1958, Tso 1981) and accumulate in various organs and tissues (Parker 1989, Kaplan et al. 1990, Tanumihardjo et al. 1990, Schmitz et al. 1991, Khachik et al. 1998, Hata et al. 2000). The highest concentration of carotenoids can be found in the eye retina of primates. In the retina of the human eye, where two dipolar carotenoids, lutein and zeaxan-thin, selectively accumulate from blood plasma, this concentration can reach as high as 0.1-1.0mM (Snodderly et al. 1984, Landrum et al. 1999). It has been shown that in the retina, carotenoids are associated with lipid bilayer membranes (Sommerburg et al. 1999, Rapp et al. 2000) although, some macular carotenoids may be connected to specific membrane-bound proteins (Bernstein et al. 1997, Bhosale et al. 2004). 

Abstract Progress that has been made in research on the chemical aspects of mammalian semiochemistry over the past decade is discussed on the basis of examples from the most topical problem areas. The chemical characterization of the volatile organic constituents of the urine, anal gland secretions and exocrine gland secretions of rodents, carnivores, proboscids, artiodactyls and primates, and their possible role in the semiochemical communication of these mammals are discussed, with particular emphasis on the advances made in the elaboration of the function of proteins as controlled release carrier materials for the semiochemicals of some of these animals. 

There have been attempts to use nonhuman primates as tissue and organ donors. In the 1960s, several surgeons transplanted kidneys from baboons or chimps into humans, and the patients survived only a few months. Born with a malformed heart. Baby Fae received a baboon heart transplant in 1984. The procedure, her... 

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