Leukocyte activation, oxidant stress and red blood cell properties after acute, exhausting exercise in rats.

Red blood cell (RBC) mechanical alterations and oxidative damage were investigated after an acute exhausting exercise in rats, together with the leukocyte activation. The groups formed as follows. Control (C) (n = 9), group I (n = 9) and group II (n = 7) from which blood samples were collected 15 minutes and 24 hours respectively, after acute exercise. The rats were subjected to running at a speed of 17 m/min until exhaustion. The leukocyte phagocytic activity (LPA), RBC lipid peroxidation and RBC deformability were measured. LPA increased significantly after the exhausting exercise and prolonged till 24 hours (p = 0.0168). RBC membrane lipid peroxidation was gradually increased till 24 hours (p = 0.0297) and there was a significant correlation between LPA and RBC lipid peroxidation (r = 0.63, p = 0.015). There was a slight but significant decrease in mean corpuscular volume (MCV) (p = 0.0467) and increase in mean corpuscular hemoglobin concentration (MCHC) (p = 0.0458) suggesting a cellular dehydration after 24 hours. No significant alteration was detected in RBC deformability, assessed by the Cell Transit Analyzer (CTA) and thought that decreased MCV might have masked to determine the alterations in membrane mechanical properties in CTA. As a conclusion the results imply that activated leukocytes might play role in the RBC damage observed after exhausting exercise encouraging oxidative stress.