Pharmacokinetics of arginine and aspartic acid administered simultaneously in the rat--III: Changes in the levels of amino acids in the plasma, liver and brain after simultaneous administration of arginine and aspartic acid.

Changes in the levels of amino acids in the plasma, liver and brain were studied in rats after simultaneous administration of 0.1 mmol/rat of arginine and aspartic acid. The levels of most of the assayed amino acids underwent various changes some of which only occurred in one of the organs studied, for example, GABA in the brain and proline in the liver. It is difficult to advance any explanation. Meanwhile some of changes can be explained on the grounds of well-known metabolic changes. The large increase of ornithine in the liver may be due to the action of arginase in the first stage in the urea cycle. This amino acid is the precursor of glutamic acid and proline which may explain the high levels of these two amino acids observed especially in the liver. The increase of GABA in the brain may be due to the simultaneous administration of arginine and aspartic acid which could induce the formation of ornithine and alpha-ketoglutaric acid respectively, two metabolites known to increase cerebral GABA. The increases in Ser, Gly, and Ala observed in practically all the tissues studied may be due to the formation of oxaloacetate from aspartic acid.