line test

line test

a test for rickets, based on observation of the lines of calcification in the growing ends of rachitic long bones in rats given vitamin D preparations under standard test conditions; used in biological assay of vitamin D by the USP.

line test

An obsolete bioassay—formerly, the “reference method”—for quantifying vitamin D, in which rachitic rats were fed a test substance of interest for five days and then dissected; the split tibia was exposed to silver nitrate, and a line of provisional calcification was identified and measured in Steenbock units; the current procedures for vitamin D require extraction, purification and radioligand or UV assay.