Cerebral metabolic compartmentation. Estimation of glucose flux via pyruvate carboxylase/pyruvate dehydrogenase by 13C NMR isotopomer analysis of D-[U-13C]glucose metabolites.

A method is presented for determining the compartmentation of amino acid metabolism in the brain. 13C NMR spectroscopy, and more specifically, homonuclear 13C-13C spin coupling patterns of 13C-labeled amino acids were used to measure the relative flux of label from D-[U-13C]glucose through the anaplerotic pathway versus the oxidative pathway. Glucose flux through the pyruvate carboxylase pathway was quantitated following primed dose constant infusion of D-[U-13C]glucose to young rabbits at a rate of 1 mg/kg body weight per min. We demonstrate, for the first time, that multiplet spectra of three adjacent 13C isotopomer in 1,2,3-13C3 in glutamine and glutamate, which are derived from [1,2,3-13C3]pyruvate, present different isotopomer populations in glutamine in comparison to that in glutamate. This is due to two different metabolic compartments characterized by the presence or absence of glutamine synthetase activity and two different tricarboxylic acid cycles, one preferentially mediated by pyruvate carboxylase and the other by pyruvate dehydrogenase. Our results indicate that the anaplerotic pathway accounts for 34% of glutamine synthesis and only 16% of glutamate and gamma-aminobutyric acid syntheses in metabolic and isotopic steady state conditions. These results support the concept, and provide a quantitative measure, that glutamine and/or tricarboxylic acid cycle intermediates are supplied by astrocytes to neurons to replenish the neurotransmitter pool of gamma-aminobutyric acid and glutamate.