A new phenotype of gastric pyloric cells. A study in baboons.

The histology of the stomach of 215 baboons having chronic gastritis (n = 7), hyperplastic foveolar gastropathy (resembling Menetrier's gastropathy in humans) (n = 2), hyperplastic foveolar lymphocytic gastritis (n = 3), adenocarcinoma (n = 1) or normal mucosa (n = 202), were reviewed. Pyloric glands having cells with a ground glass cytoplasm were found in two of the 7 animals with chronic gastritis. Those cells are characterised by an homogeneous, eosinophylic cytoplasm with "glassy" appearance. We previously found pyloric cells with ground-glass cytoplasm in gastrectomy specimens from patients dwelling in disparate geographic regions, suggesting that those cells occur independently of the race of the individuals or of different environmental conditions. The same cells are now found in the gastric antrum of baboons. "Glassy" pyloric cells showed a moderate positivity with PAS stain but they were negative after diastase treatment, suggesting that the glassy material may be a glycoprotein.