ABSTRACT
Phenylhydrazine, a well known hemolysin, has been used as an agent to induce hemolytic anemia in order to discern the mechanisms of hemopoiesis, erythrocyte kinetics and related matters in virtually all submammalian and mammalian experimental animals. Robert Heinz is credited as the first to examine in scientific detail the inclusions that develop in erythrocytes as a result of an animal’s exposure to phenylhydrazine and its derivatives. He also formulated an isotonic saline solution of methyl violet to stain these structures supravitally. The aggregate of compounds capable of inducing Heinz body formation is characterized by a high redox potential. Heinz body development has also been monitored in red cells isolated in vivo within millipore-type diffusion chambers implanted up to 24 hr in the peritoneal cavity of rabbits receiving parenteral phenylhydrazine. The terminal step of the erythrophagocytosis was the formation of a round membrane-bound phagocytic vacuole containing the digested, electron-dense end product of the Heinz body, presumed to be hemosiderin.
