The use of a liver biopsy technique for investigating the effects of hexacholrobenzene on some drug-metabolising enzymes in sheep.

Several parameters of drug-metabolising capacity were measured in samples taken from various regions of the sheep liver. A statistically significant difference of 10 per cent between mean values of enzyme activities of the ventral and dorsal lobes was found. This could be ignored when compared with the expected treatment effect. It is concluded that the biopsy technique provides a sufficiently representative sample of the whole liver for use in studies of the type described. The results also indicated that the liver enzyme levels of young lambs were lower than those of older lambs and adult sheep. Sheep dosed with hexachlorobenzene (hcb) showed increased activities of aniline hydroxylase and 4-nitroanisole O-demethylase but not of the NADPH-independent esterases. It is concluded that HCB induces the drug-metabolising enzymes of sheep liver.