Investigation of Stress Induced Alterations in Neutrophil Function

The primary goal of our research is to investigate the effects of 1) psychological and physical stress in human subjects during and after a military medical field exercise and cold stress in a rat model on neutrophil functions, including cells ability to migrate, adhere, and undergo respiratory burst. The relationships among adrenal hormones, stress, and neutrophil function will also be investigated. The Bushmaster exercise, is required of all fourth year medical students at USUHS and is held three times each year. Because of limits on our ability to assay large numbers of samples of fresh blood, and because each exercise session may differ slightly, our strategy is to assess stress and neutrophil activity from several Bushmaster sessions and combine the data across a two-year period. The effect of cold stress on rats will be evaluated after four hours exposure to 4 C and compared to responses of rats maintained at 25 C. Because of the limited number of cells available from each rat, studies were conducted using neutrophils collected from blood pooled from 3-4 rats. (kt)