Qualitative and quantitative freeze-fracture studies on olfactory and nasal respiratory epithelial surfaces of frog, ox, rat, and dog. III. Tight-junctions.

A comparison of the tight-junctions of various cell types in the nasal epithelia of frog, ox, rat and dog shows that Bowman's gland cells have lowest number of strands (4-8), whereas olfactory receptor and supporting, and ciliated respiratory cells show no conspicuous differences and have 6-11 strands. Tight-junctional strand numbers show slight species-dependent variations. In regions where three cells join (observed for receptor and respiratory cells), fracture faces show two parallel strands which fuse at certain points. These strands run perpendicularly to the rest of the tight-junctional belt, which also shows an increased number of strands (13-16) in this region. Tight-junctions of mammalian olfactory dendritic endings usually show strands composed of particles, whereas those of the other three epithelial cell types consist of continuous or discontinuous bars. Tight-junctions of dendritic endings of the frog also conform to the latter type. Differences in strand density are only slight and range from 16-27 strands/microns. Small angular gap-junctions were observed only within the tight-juctions of supporting cells in the rat.