Influência da temperatura na cicatrização do tegumento de jacaré-do-pantanal Caiman yacare (DAUDIN, 1802).

Abstract

Studies of tissue healing in reptiles are common in lizards and less frequent in snakes. In crocodilians, there are only a rare collection of case reports. Crocodilians are a consolidated group, consisting of morphologically adapted animals to aquatic life and strong influenced by environmental temperature. In husbandry conditions, there are frequent mutilations of entire appendages, or even the formation of wounds. In this sense, it is necessary to understand how temperature affects the responses of tissue restitution of these organisms. For that 16 Caiman yacare were submitted to surgical removal of an osteoderm and kept at 23 ºC and 33 ºC, 8 caiman at each temperature. Subsequently, the caimans had their injuries photographed for macroscopic analysis. For microscopic analysis, 2 alligators of each treatment had their scars fixed at 3, 7, 15 and 30 days after surgery. The samples were processed for microscopy and stained for histochemistry and immunohistochemistry. Macroscopically, the clot was maintained until 30 days under temperature of 23 °C, while the scar had been re-epithelized under 33 °C. Microscopically, it was observed the delay of epidermis migration, lack of fibers and new vessels in dermis under 23 °C. Despite the caimans have remained fully viable at both temperatures up to 30 days, we recommend the isolation of mutilated animals in a tank with controlled temperature to accelerate epidermal closure.