PMID: 6112263Jun 1, 1981Paper

Glutathione and gamma-glutamyl cycle enzymes in human fetal liver

The Journal of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics
D RollinsA Rane

Abstract

Human fetal and adult liver were found to have similar concentrations of acid soluble sulfhydryl (SH) groups (7.4 mmol/kg) in the same range as is found in adult mouse and rat liver. The concentration was 4-fold higher than in human fetal adrenal gland tissue. Methods specific for glutathione (GSH) associated SH groups revealed that the postmortem levels of GSH is very low (0.4 mmol/kg) in relation to total SH groups. In contrast, the levels of cysteine were high (2.8 mmol/kg), indicating a rapid cleavage of GSH. Only negligible amounts of gamma-glutamylcysteine and cysteinylglycine were measured. Our findings may be explained by high fetal activity of gamma-glutamyl transpeptidase (which metabolizes GSH) that has been documented previously both in man and in experimental animals. High activities of the two GSH-synthesizing enzymes, gamma-glutamylcysteine synthetase and GSH synthetase were found in the human fetal liver (7.1 and 3.0 mukat/kg, respectively). The activities of these enzymes were in the same range as in human adult liver, whereas that of gamma-glutamyl transpeptidase was 3-fold higher in the fetal liver. Our results demonstrate the presence of high concentration of SH groups and capacity to synthesize GSH already ...Continue Reading

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