The metabolic fate of the products of citrate cleavage. Adenosine triphosphate citrate lyase and nicotinamide–adenine dinucleotide phosphate-linked malate dehydrogenase in foetal and adult liver from ruminants and non-ruminants

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Abstract
1. Foetal rat liver slices incorporate the C-3 of aspartate and C-2 of glutamate into fatty acids at rates equal to those observed with adult rat liver slices. Incorporation of either of these labelled carbon atoms into fatty acids would require a functioning citrate-cleavage pathway which consists of the enzymes ATP–citrate lyase, NAD–malate dehydrogenase and NADP–malate dehydrogenase. However, NADP–malate dehydrogenase is present in foetal rat liver at only 5% of the activity detectable in adult rat liver. 2. From these findings and the effect of cofactors on the formation of 14CO2 from [1,5−14C2]citrate in liver supernatant fractions (100000g), it is suggested that NADP–malate dehydrogenase limits the citrate-cleavage sequence. 3. Measurement of the citrate-cleavage pathway by incorporation studies with [3−14C]aspartate and [U−14C]glucose and by determining the activities of ATP–citrate lyase and NADP–malate dehydrogenase have shown that this sequence of reactions is present in the liver of the bovine foetus but not in the adult. However, C-2 of glutamate is not incorporated into fatty acids or non-saponifiable lipid by bovine liver slices. This finding as well as those presented above for the adult and foetal rat liver are interpreted on the basis of a competition between phosphoenolpyruvate carboxykinase and NAD–malate dehydrogenase for oxaloacetate produced by the cleavage of citrate in the cytosol.