Table 2.

Status of Cu-adequate and Cu-deficient male rats following copper deficiency

	Postnatal		Perinatal		Perinatal
Characteristic	Cu+	Cu−	Cu+	Cu−	Cu+	Cu−
Age, days	50	50	24	24	13	13
Body weight, g	276 ± 17	280 ± 20	89 ± 1.1	45 ± 1.5*	38.2 ± 1.9	31.6 ± 1.7*
Hemoglobin, g/L	162 ± 1.7	112 ± 25	102 ± 3.0	53.8 ± 3.5*	98.0 ± 2.5	67.6 ± 2.8*
Brain Cu, μg/g	2.55 ± 0.32	1.61 ± 0.07*	2.22 ± 0.07	0.29 ± 0.07*	1.31 ± 0.11	0.35 ± 0.04*
Brain Fe, μg/g	11.5 ± 0.32	11.3 ± 0.94	9.03 ± 0.30	5.50 ± 0.38*	6.11 ± 0.28	4.10 ± 0.17*
Plasma Fe, μg/mL	2.29 ± 0.07	1.17 ± 0.21*	3.01	0.34	ND	ND

Values are means ± SEM. Postnatal rats (n = 3) were maintained on Cu-adequate (Cu+) or Cu-deficient (Cu−) treatment for 30 days after weaning. Perinatal rats (n = 4) were born to, and nursed by, Cu-deficient or Cu-adequate dams. Treatment began 2 weeks prior to parturition. Brain iron concentration was corrected for blood iron contamination. For suckling rats, plasma iron was a pooled estimate and only available for 24-day-old pups. For a given age, treatment means were tested by unpaired Student's t-test,

^*p < 0.05.