Hepatobiliary transport of glutathione and glutathione conjugate in rats with hereditary hyperbilirubinemia.

TR- mutant rats have an autosomal recessive mutation that is expressed as a severely impaired hepatobiliary secretion of organic anions like bilirubin-(di)glucuronide and dibromosulphthalein (DBSP). In this paper, the hepatobiliary transport of glutathione and a glutathione conjugate was studied in normal Wistar rats and TR- rats. It was shown that glutathione is virtually absent from the bile of TR- rats. In the isolated, perfused liver the secretion of glutathione and the glutathione conjugate, dinitrophenyl-glutathione (GS-DNP), from hepatocyte to bile is severely impaired, whereas the sinusoidal secretion from liver to blood is not affected. The secretion of GS-DNP was also studied in isolated hepatocytes. The secretion of GS-DNP from cells isolated from TR- rat liver was significantly slower than from normal hepatocytes. Efflux of GS-DNP was a saturable process with respect to intracellular GS-DNP concentration: Vmax and Km for efflux from TR- cells was 498 nmol/min.g dry wt and 3.3 mM, respectively, as compared with 1514 nmol/min.g dry wt and 0.92 mM in normal hepatocytes. These results suggest that the canalicular transport system for glutathione and glutathione conjugates is severely impaired in TR- rats, whereas sinusoidal efflux is unaffected. Because the defect also comes to expression in isolated hepatocytes, efflux of GS-DNP from normal hepatocytes must predominantly be mediated by the canalicular transport mechanism, which is deficient in TR- rats.

ATP-dependent efflux of GSSG and GS-conjugate from isolated rat hepatocytes.

The driving force for efflux of dinitrophenyl-glutathione (GS-DNP) and oxidized glutathione (GSSG) from freshly isolated rat hepatocytes was studied. Incubation of hepatocytes in Krebs with increasing K+ concentrations (equivalently replaced for Na+) or in Krebs with 3 mM ouabain led to a partial or complete dissipation of the plasma membrane potential, as measured by the equilibrium distribution of 36Cl-. This had no effect on the initial efflux rate of GSSG and GS-DNP. On the other hand, partial depletion of the cellular ATP content via different independent mechanisms significantly reduced the initial efflux rate of these compounds. Titration of the cellular ATP content by incubation of the cells with different concentrations of atractyloside revealed a linear relation between the cellular ATP content and the initial efflux rate of GS-DNP. The efflux of GS-DNP was also studied in hepatocytes from mutant rats with hepatobiliary transport defect (TR- rats). These rats have a hereditary canalicular secretion defect for a number of organic anions including GS-DNP. As we have shown previously, the efflux of GS-DNP from TR- rat hepatocytes is significantly slower than from normal hepatocytes (J. Clin. Invest. 84: 476-483, 1989). Depletion of the cellular ATP content in these cells had no significant effect on the residual efflux of GS-DNP. From these studies, we conclude that an ATP-dependent transport system for oxidized glutathione and glutathione conjugates is involved in the biliary transport of these compounds. The possible relation of this transport system with that described in other cell types and tissues, like erythrocytes and heart sarcolemma, is discussed.