A comparison of the amino acid concentrating ability of the kidney cortex of newborn and mature rats

It has frequently been demonstrated that there are multiple mechanisms for amino acid transport and that these function to maintain a favorable intracellular level of amino acids within cells. In some instances they also make possible the transport of amino acids from one face of a cell layer to the other. In general, developing tissues have a higher concentrating ability than mature tissues. In the kidney, however, it has been observed that the ability to reabsorb amino acids may be less effective in developing than in mature organisms. Studies were carried out to determine whether the newborn rat kidney cortex differed from mature cortex in its ability to concentrate a representative group of amino acids. In general, the patterns observed for the concentrative uptake of glycine, L-leucine, α-aminoisobutyric acid, L-aspartic acid, and L-lysine were the same. In all cases uptake was initially more rapid in the mature tissue, but the concentration ratios ultimately reached were higher in the newborn tissues. It is concluded that, as in other developing tissues, newborn rat kidney cortex has a high concentrating ability and might therefore be expected to reabsorb amino acids at least as effectively as mature cortex. However the observation that uptake is relatively slow initially suggests that although the ability to establish a gradient at equilibrium is high the capacity of the system is relatively low and this may account for the apparent low capacity of the immature kidney to reabsorb amino acids.