Rat Unit

Rat Unit: what is it?

The Rat Unit (RU) is a unit of estrogen biological activity that is determined based on the minimum amount of estrogen required to cause keratinization of the vaginal epithelium in castrated female rats. This unit is widely used in the pharmaceutical and biological industries to measure estrogen activity.

Castration of female rats leads to a decrease in estrogen levels in the body and causes degeneration of the vaginal epithelium. The introduction of various concentrations of estrogen into the body of castrated female rats makes it possible to determine the minimum dose required to cause keratinization of the vaginal epithelium. It is this minimum dose that is one Rat Unit.

The Rat Unit is an important tool for studying estrogens and their effects on the body. It is used to measure estrogen activity in various materials such as blood, urine, bile, milk and other body fluids. In addition, the Rat Unit helps establish the relationship between various estrogens and their biological activities.

Although the Rat Unit was designed to measure estrogen activity, it can also be used to measure the activity of other hormones. For example, there are analogues of the Rat Unit for measuring androgen activity.

In conclusion, the Rat Unit is an important tool for studying estrogens and their effects on the body. It allows one to determine the minimum dose of estrogen required to induce keratinization of the vaginal epithelium in castrated female rats and use this information to measure estrogen activity in various biological materials.

Contents * Introduction * Main body + What are rat units + How to measure rat units + Functioning of rat units How rat unit values ​​change according to age and other factors

Basic information Currently, special attention is paid to the sexual function of women. Cyclic processes occur in the female gonads, including egg maturation, ovulation, formation of the corpus luteum, menstrual bleeding and ovulation bleeding. In the regulation of processes in the female reproductive system, the influence of not only sex hormones plays an important role, but also the interaction of endogenous factors such as age, stressors, and anatomical and physiological factors. These biological factors have a variety of effects on estrogen-reactive systems, varying in nature and strength. Most scientists considered the impact of these biological factors on a woman’s body, having no idea about such units of measurement that would sufficiently fully reflect all these processes. Much attention was paid to elucidating the influence of gonadotropic hormones (such as gonadotropin and luteotropin) on involutive processes in the cells of the reproductive organs. There is little to no knowledge of metabolic factors (e.g., from studies in rats) that may cause functional loss in the system. It is the presence of these factors that makes it possible to evaluate in laboratory conditions the effect of hormonal drugs on processes in the genital organs, taking into account the effect in rat units. What is the unit of biological action of estrogen? Biological action unit (BU) introduced by K