Abstract
The thymus consists of two poorly encapsulated lobes which arise in the embryo as separate primordia on each side of the midline in the neck region. During ontogeny, the organ migrates caudally and medially to the superior mediastinum where the two lobes become closely connected, although they do not appear to fuse. The relative weight is largest about a week after birth; the absolute weight is largest at about the age of 2 months and then gradually declines. In old rats, especially in preterminal condition, the organ can be so small that it is hardly recognizable in the mediastinal fat tissue.
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Kuper, C.F., Beems, R.B., Hollanders, V.M.H. (1990). Development and Aging, Thymus, Rat. In: Jones, T.C., Ward, J.M., Mohr, U., Hunt, R.D. (eds) Hemopoietic System. Monographs on Pathology of Laboratory Animals. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-84110-1_41
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-84110-1_41
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