Ultrastructural immunocytochemical localization of neurophysin and vasopressin in the median eminence and posterior pituitary of the guinea pig.

With the use of tissue prepared by freeze-substitution and the unlabelled antibody enzyme technique, neurophysin and vasopressin were localized at the ultrastructural level in the pofterior pituitary and median eminence of the guinea pig. In the posterior pituitary neurophysin was found in the large neurosecretory granules (1300-1500 A) of axons, Herring bodies, and nerve terminals. In some of these axons immunoreactive neurophysin was found outside of granules in the axoplasm. By light microscopy neurophysin was found in both the zona interna and zona externa of the median eminence; this was confirmed by electron microscopy. In the zona interna as in the posterior pituitary, neurophysin was localized both inside and outside the large neurosecretory granules. In the zona externa, immunoreactive deposit was primarily located in granules with a diameter of 900-1100 A in nerve terminals abutting on the primary portal plexus. The distribution of vasopressin paralleled that of neurophysin except that the hormone was rarely extragranular. These results demonstrate for the first time that both neurophysin and vasopressin are present in granules of axons that are in contact with the hypophysial portal vasculature.