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The long-term administration of L-carnitine was very effective in preventing cardiomegaly in juvenile visceral steatosis (JVS) mice, which was confirmed by heart weight as well as the lipid contents in heart tissue. After i.p. injection of L-carnitine, the concentration of free carnitine in heart remained constant, although serum free carnitine level increased up to 80-fold. On the other hand, a significant increase in short-chain acyl-carnitine level in heart was observed. These results suggest that increased levels of short-chain acyl-carnitine, not free carnitine, might be a key compound in the protective effect of L-carnitine administration in JVS mice.

In order to test the possibility that free fatty acids are the mediator of the abnormal expression of urea cycle enzyme genes in carnitine-deficient juvenile visceral steatosis (JVS) mice, the effects of fatty acids on urea cycle enzyme, carbamoylphosphate synthetase (CPS) and argininosuccinate synthetase (ASS), mRNA levels were examined in rat primary cultured hepatocytes. Addition of a synthetic glucocorticoid hormone, dexamethasone, caused increases in CPS and ASS mRNAs. Further addition of oleic acid suppressed the induction of CPS and ASS mRNAs by dexamethasone. In contrast, the phosphoenolpyruvate carboxykinase (PEPCK) mRNA level induced by dexamethasone was enhanced in the presence of oleic acid. The effects were reversed on further addition of carnitine. The mRNA levels of these enzymes induced by dibutyryl cAMP were not affected by the addition of oleic acid. A study of the specificity of fatty acids revealed that long-chain fatty acids of more than 16 carbons chain length had a suppressive effect on the CPS mRNA level induced by dexamethasone and that the presence of double bonds enhanced the effect. The changes in gene expression of CPS, ASS and PEPCK caused by the fatty acids in the cultured hepatocytes were very similar to those observed in the liver of JVS mice. The AP-1 DNA binding activity in the presence of dexamethasone was slightly enhanced by the addition of oleic acid. These results suggest that the long-chain fatty acids not metabolized in JVS mice are mediators of the abnormal gene expression in the liver which results in hyperammonemia.

Deficiency of argininosuccinate synthetase (ASS) causes citrullinemia. Type II citrullinemia is found in most patients with adult-onset citrullinemia in Japan, and ASS is deficient specifically in the liver. Previous studies have shown that the decrease of hepatic ASS activity is caused by a decrease in enzyme protein with normal kinetic properties and that there are no apparent abnormalities in the amount, translational activity, and nucleotide sequence of hepatic ASS mRNA. Recent results of homozygosity testing indicate that the primary defect of type II citrullinemia is not within the ASS gene locus. In this present work, to understand the pathogenesis and pathophysiology of type II citrullinemia, we have characterized the alterations of gene expression in the liver of type II patients using the recently developed mRNA differential display method. Some cDNA bands expressed differently in type II citrullinemia patients and control were selected, cloned, and sequenced. Nucleotide sequence analysis and homology searching revealed an interesting clone which has 99% homology with the human pancreatic secretory trypsin inhibitor (hPSTI). Northern blot and RT-PCR analyses showed that the expression of hPSTI mRNA increased significantly in the liver of all type II patients tested. Furthermore, the concentration of hPSTI protein was found to be higher in the liver of type II citrullinemia than in control. These results suggest that hPSTI may be related to the primary defect of type II citrullinemia and may be useful as a diagnostic marker, although the detailed mechanism of the high expression of hPSTI mRNA in type II liver is not yet known.

Proform serum calcium-decreasing factor (procaldecrin) was purified from porcine pancreas acetone powder. Procaldecrin showed chymotrypsin activity after trypsin treatment in a time- and dose-dependent manner. Procaldecrin did not possess serum calcium-decreasing activity but acquired serum calcium-decreasing activity as well as protease activity after trypsin treatment. However, PMSF treatment after activation of procaldecrin by trypsin did not affect the serum calcium-decreasing activity, even though protease activity was nullified by treatment with PMSF. These findings suggest that the serum calcium-decreasing activity acquired by procaldecrin requires conformational change caused by trypsin treatment.

We purified a serum calcium-decreasing factor, which showed chymotrypsin-like protease activity, from porcine pancreas to homogeneity. The factor administered to mice intravenously at a dose of 20 micrograms/kg b.w. decreased serum calcium by 15%. Treatment of the factor with the serine protease inhibitor, PMSF, caused a leftward shift in the dose-response curve, showing strengthened activity. It also caused a decrease in serum calcium and hydroxyproline levels in rats. At a dose of 10 ng/ml, the factor inhibited 45Ca release from cultured fetal long bone stimulated by parathyroid hormone (PTH) and PTH-related protein, but not by interleukin-1 alpha, prostaglandin E1 and 1,25-dihydroxy vitamin D3. No other well-known pancreatic proteases had these effects. In view of the results of experiments using protease inhibitor and pancreatic proteases, and in view of the specificity of this factor in vitro, we propose that the factor exerts its serum calcium-decreasing activity most probably not through proteolytic degradation of PTH, but through an inhibition of PTH action on bones by a yet undefined mechanism.

We introduced rat ornithine transcarbamylase (OTC) gene into OTC-deficient spf-ash mice by mating spf-ash heterozygotes with transgenic mice which carried recombinant DNA composed of 1.3 kb of the 5' flanking region of the gene fused onto rat OTC cDNA. The liver OTC activity of hemizygous spf-ash mice which carried the transgene was about twice that of nontransgenic spf-ash mice, and the small intestinal OTC activity was 6 times higher; the values being 12% and 27% of the control levels, respectively. The transgenic spf-ash mice showed normal hair growth without sparse fur, nearly normalized urinary orotic acid excretion and normalized serum citrulline concentration.

We determined the activities of urea cycle enzymes in the liver of C3H-H-2 degree-jsv mice. The activities of all urea cycle enzymes decreased in the latter period of lactation. The activities of carbamylphosphate synthetase and ornithine transcarbamylase in some affected mice were undetectable. On the other hand, the activities of enzymes other than urea cycle enzymes were normal. We consider that the decrease in the urea cycle enzymes is caused by an abnormality in the mechanism of gene expression.

In the present study, we isolated clones of human argininosuccinate lyase (ASL) cDNA from a liver cDNA library using a clone of rat ASL cDNA and analyzed human ASL cDNA nucleotide sequence. The results reveal that the sequence of human ASL cDNA published by O'Brien et al. in 1986 [Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci USA 83, 7211-7215] had one-base deletions at three independent positions in the coding regions near the COOH-terminus, which caused frame-shift variations in the amino acid sequence. Amino acid sequencing of peptides prepared from purified human liver ASL showed our predicted amino acid sequence to be correct.