Skeletal Storage of Fluorine in the Growing Rat Fed Bone Meals of Varying Fluorine Content. ∗

Summary

It was demonstrated again that veal calf bones were low in fluorine. This experiment demonstrated clearly that bone meal prepared from veal calf bones produced femurs with an exceptionally low fluorine content, thus indicating a calcium and phosphorus carrier of high desirability insofar as the fluorine content is concerned. Commercial bone meals were found in this experiment to be responsible for the deposition of considerable amounts of fluorine in the femurs of the growing rat.

These data, further, suggest that the high levels of tone meal feeding in the case of the growing rat resulted in a limited utilization of the minerals as indicated by the storage of fluorine in the femurs and that the fluorine present in bone meal is not selectively absorbed.

Some of these data seemed to indicate that a part of the fluorine in veal calf bones was there in a form not readily available for absorption and storage in the skeleton of the rat.