Regulation of the major detoxication functions by phenobarbital and 3-methylcholanthrene in co-cultures of rat hepatocytes and liver epithelial cells.

In the present study, we analysed the expression of monooxygenase activities and mRNAs associated with cytochrome P-450 (CYP), including CYP1A1/2, CYP2B1/2, CYP2C6, CYP2E1, CYP3A1/2, glutathione transferase alpha (GST alpha), aldehyde dehydrogenase and epoxide hydrolase in co-cultures of primary rat hepatocytes and rat liver epithelial cells. We observed that pentoxyresorufin O-deethylation activity was well maintained and ethoxyresorufin O-deethylation activity gradually decreased during co-culture time. In addition, we showed that phenobarbital and 3-methylcholanthrene treatments resulted in a significant increase of these activities. Two general patterns of accumulation of liver-specific mRNAs were observed. CYP1A1/2, CYP2B1/2, CYP3A1/2, GST alpha, aldehyde dehydrogenase and epoxide hydrolase mRNAs were maintained at a stable level, whereas CYP2C6 and CYP2E1 mRNAs showed a continuous decline. In addition, we observed a strong increase of CYP1A1/2 (13.6-fold) and GST alpha (3.9-fold) mRNA expression in 3-methylcholanthrene-treated co-cultures and induction of CYP2B1/2 (19-fold), CYP2C6 (10-fold), CYP3A1/2 (11.2-fold), GST alpha (9-fold), aldehyde dehydrogenase (6-fold) and epoxide hydrolase (5-fold) mRNA expression in phenobarbital-treated co-cultures. Furthermore, we demonstrated that liver-specific gene expression was restricted to hepatocytes, with the notable exception of epoxide hydrolase and CYP2E1 which were expressed in both cell types during the co-culture, as shown by the selective recovery of both hepatocytes and rat liver epithelial cells. Finally, to investigate whether co-cultures could be used to study the molecular mechanisms regulating CYP transcription, we performed transfection of hepatocytes, before the establishment of the co-culture, with large CYP2B1 (3.9 kb) or CYP2B2 (4.5 kb) promoter chloramphenicol acetyltransferase constructs or with a construct containing a 163-bp DNA sequence element reported to confer phenobarbital responsiveness. A 2-3-fold increase over the basal level of chloramphenicol acetyltransferase activity was observed in phenobarbital-treated co-cultures transfected with the phenobarbital-responsive element construct, although phenobarbital had no effect on large CYP2B1 or CYP2B2 promoter fragments. Our results demonstrate that the co-culture system provides a good tool for studying drug metabolism, and shows promise as a new tool for analysing transcriptional regulation under the influence of xenobiotics within primary hepatocytes.