Conversion of xanthine dehydrogenase to oxidase in ischemic rat tissues.

In response to global ischemia, tissue xanthine dehydrogenase was converted to xanthine oxidase in all tissues with half-times of conversion at 37 degrees C of approximately 3.6, 6, 7, and 14 h for the liver, kidney, heart, and lung, respectively. The time course of enzyme conversion at 4 degrees C was greatly extended with half-conversion times of 6, 5, 5, and 6 d for the respective tissues. Increases in xanthine oxidase activity were accompanied by the appearance of a distinct new protein species with greater electrophoretic mobility. The oxidase from ischemic rat liver was purified 781-fold and found to migrate with a higher mobility on native gels than the purified native dehydrogenase. Sodium dodecyl sulfate profiles revealed the presence of a single major band of 137 kD for the native dehydrogenase, whereas the oxidase had been partially cleaved generating polypeptides of 127, 91, and 57 kD. Polypeptide patterns for the oxidase resemble those seen following limited in vitro proteolysis of the native dehydrogenase supporting a proteolytic mechanism for the conversion of xanthine dehydrogenase to oxidase in ischemic rat liver.

A tungsten-supplemented diet delivered by transplacental and breast-feeding routes lowers intestinal xanthine oxidase activity and affords cytoprotection in ischemia-reperfusion injury to the small intestine.

Ischemia-reperfusion injury has been implicated as playing a major role in the development of necrotizing enterocolitis, a major cause of morbidity and mortality in the newborn. A tungsten-supplemented molybdenum-free diet can reduce xanthine oxidase (XO) enzyme activity in the intestine, which in turn reduces the generation of oxygen radicals after an ischemia-reperfusion insult. This study evaluated the ability of this diet to be effective by indirect means, ie, transplacental and breast-feeding routes. XO activity of the intestine was measured in three groups of CD-1 white rats: I, weanlings fed the tungsten diet or standard chow for 1 week; II, 1-day-old rat pups whose mothers were maintained on the tungsten or standard chow for 7 to 10 days prior to term; and III, rat pups at 1 and 3 weeks after birth whose lactating mothers were maintained on the tungsten or standard chow. Some animals from group III also underwent either a 30- or 60-minute episode of occlusion of the superior mesenteric artery (SMA) to evaluate the protective effects of the diet. XO activity was significantly reduced in all groups receiving the tungsten diet (P less than .0001). Blinded histopathologic studies of the entire small bowel showed significantly less villar necrosis (P less than .05) and fibrosis (P less than .0001) in the tungsten-treated group than in the controls. In the 60-minute occlusion study all tungsten-group animals survived, whereas 7 of 12 in the control group died of intestinal infarction within 24 hours (P less than .001).(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

Mechanisms of conversion of xanthine dehydrogenase to xanthine oxidase in ischemic rat liver and kidney.

Previous studies have proposed and supported a role for the proteolytic, irreversible conversion of xanthine dehydrogenase to xanthine oxidase (XO) in postischemic injury in a wide variety of organs. A second mechanism of conversion, due to sulfhydryl modification and reversible with dithiothreitol (DTT), is potentially important but has not been well investigated. In this study rat liver and kidney were found to produce significant amounts of DTT-reversible XO during normothermic global ischemia. Formation of reversible XO precedes that of irreversible XO by approximately 0.5 h with a strong correlation (r = 0.92) existing between the rate of irreversible XO formation and the concentration of reversible XO. The formation of reversible XO is preceded by a depletion of glutathione with concentrations of glutathione during ischemia correlating (r = 0.85) with the observed concentration of reversible XO. While a large increase in the extent of liver damage occurs concurrently with conversion in an in vivo liver model of liver ischemia, an ischemia-reperfusion regimen (1 h of ischemia plus 0.5 h of reperfusion) that resulted in no conversion caused significant elevations in serum glutamic pyruvic transaminase and serum glutamic-oxaloacetic transaminase. Rats depleted of XO by tungsten dieting release 65% less enzyme after the same insult, suggesting that endogenous XO may also participate in the damage process independent of any conversion.