Identification and characterization of glucose transport proteins in plasma membrane- and Golgi vesicle-enriched fractions prepared from lactating rat mammary gland.

Plasma membrane- and Golgi vesicle-enriched membrane fractions were prepared from day-10 lactating rat mammary glands. Each fraction was found to contain a single set of D-glucose-inhibitable cytochalasin B-binding sites: plasma membranes and Golgi vesicles bound 20 +/- 2 and 53 +/- 4 pmol of cytochalasin/mg of membrane protein (means +/- S.E.M.), with dissociation constants of 259 +/- 47 and 520 +/- 47 nM respectively. Anti-peptide antibodies against the C-terminal region (residues 477-492) of the rat brain/human erythrocyte glucose transporter labelled a sharp band of apparent Mr 50,000 on Western blots of both fractions. Treatment with endoglycosidase F before blotting decreased the apparent Mr of this band to 38,000, indicating that it corresponded to a glycoprotein. Confirmation that this immunologically cross-reactive band was a glucose transporter was provided by the demonstration that it could be photoaffinity-labelled, in a D-glucose-sensitive fashion, with cytochalasin B. Quantitative Western blotting studies yielded values of 28 +/- 5 and 23 +/- 3 pmol of immunologically cross-reactive glucose transporters/mg of membrane protein in the plasma membrane and Golgi vesicle fractions respectively. From comparison with the concentration of cytochalasin B-binding sites, it is concluded that a protein homologous to the rat brain glucose transporter constitutes the major glucose transport species in the plasma membranes of mammary gland epithelial cells. Glucose transporters are also found in the Golgi membranes of these cells, at least half of them being similar, if not identical, to the transporters of the plasma membrane. However, their function in this location remains unclear.