Zinc accumulation and succinate dehydrogenase activation in hepatic mitochondria of rats orally administered zinc sulfate.

Abstract
The changes of enzyme activities in subcellular fractions of rat liver were investigated after a single oral administration of zinc sulfate (20 mg Zn/100 g body weight). Zinc contents in the fractions of plasma membrane, nuclei, mitochondria, microsomes and cytosol were significantly increased 3 h after zinc administration. On the other hand, a significant decrease of the microsomal glucose-6-phosphatase activity and a remarkable elevation of the mitochondrial succinate dehydrogenase activity were caused by zinc administration, while the activities of the plasma membrane Ca2+-adenosine triphosphatase (ATPase), nuclear ribonucleic acid (RNA) polymerase and cytosolic acid phosphatase were not significantly altered. At the lowest dose (5 mg Zn/100 g) used in this experiment, the microsomal glucose-6-phosphatase activity was not significantly decreased, while the mitochondrial succinate dehydrogenase activity was markedly increased. Also, activation of succinate dehydrogenase in the liver mitochondria was observed at 12 h after zinc administration (10 mg Zn/100 g). The present study indicates that zinc taken up by the liver cells accumulates in the mitochondria and the metal may have an effect on the mitochondrial functions.
Keywords

This publication has 4 references indexed in Scilit: