Table 2. Hematological parameters of adult rats treated with control and restricted-iron (ARI) or enriched-iron (AEI) diets and of young rats.

	Young	Control	ARI	AEI
Erythrocytes (million/mm3)	8.82±0.34	8.62±0.48	8.90±0.68	8.75±0.39
Hemoglobin (g/dL)	17.3±0.9 (**)	15.8±0.5	16.5±0.6	16.2±0.8
Hematocrit (%)	51.6±3.2 (***)	45.1±1.0	47.4±1.7 (*)	46.7±1.2 (*)
Serum Iron (µg/dL)	242±106	226±34	164±99	346±78 (**)
Transferrin saturation (%)	58.9±22.3	63.7±19.8	39.6±23.6	75.2±13.2
Transferrin (mg/dL)	282±22	283±49	294±25	320±32
C-Reactive Protein (mg/dL)	0.33±0.11 (*)	0.48±0.06	0.56±0.12	0.38±0.11 (*)
Gamma glutamyl transferase (U/L)	3±2	1±0	1±0	7±5 (*)

Average and standard deviation: n = 7 (CT); n = 5 (ARI); n = 8 (AEI); n = 6 (young). Difference between the control group and test groups:

^*p≤0.05;

^**p≤0.01;

^***p≤0.001 (Student's t-test).