To evaluate the role of dietary polyamines in maturation of the rat small intestine, spermine was given orally twice daily to suckling pups from day 10 to day 14 postpartum at different doses: 0, 0.2, 0.5, 1, 2.5, and 5 mumol/dose. Compared to saline treated controls, spermine (5 mumol) produced significant increases in mucosal mass parameters (+12 to +57%, P < 0.05), induced prematurely an adult pattern of microvillous enzymes, and enhanced, respectively, by 19- and 3.5-fold (P < 0.01 vs controls) the concentration of the secretory component of p-immunoglobulins in villous and crypt cells. The response of microvillous enzymes (lactase, sucrase, maltase, and aminopeptidase) to spermine was dose-dependent and -specific since oral administration of arginine (5 mumol) or ornithine (5 mumol) was without effect. Intestinal changes were found to be significant (P < 0.05) for doses of spermine exceeding 1 mumol/day, which is in the range of the amount of polyamines provided by solid pellets at weaning (0.4 mumol/g). However, intestinal changes were undetectable at the physiological amounts of polyamines consumed by pups from rat milk during the suckling period (less than 0.3 mumol/day). Consistent with a direct effect of spermine on the intestinal cell, the cytosolic activity of ornithine decarboxylase was depressed by 27-fold (P < 0.005 vs controls) in the jejunum, while inhibition of ornithine decarboxylase by alpha-difluoromethylornithine did markedly decrease but did not suppress the cell response to spermine. Alternately, plasma corticosteronemia, which was virtually absent by day 14 in controls, ranged between 1.4 and 4.6 micrograms/dl in 60% (N = 9) of the spermine-treated rats.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

Using a polyclonal antibody raised against a highly conserved sequence of 38 amino acids containing the activation site (VTDSAAGAT) common to mammalian and yeast alkaline phosphatases (AP), we identified in decapsidated Saccharomyces boulardii a protein phosphatase detected by autoradiography as a single signal (63 kD). Using an affinity chromatography column, the protein phosphatase could be concentrated 39.1-fold and presented as a doublet of two subunits. Compared with rat and bovine purified intestinal AP, the enzyme from S. boulardii had a greater ability to dephosphorylate the lipopolysaccharide (LPS) of Escherichia coli 055B5. When tested in vivo, intraperitoneal injection of intact LPS to rats produced, after 9 h, 100 ng/mL of circulating tumor necrosis factor-␣ with inflammatory lesions and apoptotic bodies in the liver and the heart, whereas rats injected with partially dephosphorylated LPS produced only 40 ng/mL tumor necrosis factor-␣ without organic lesions. In conclusion, S. boulardii is able to inhibit toxicity of E. coli surface endotoxins by the release of a protein phosphatase exhibiting a great capacity of dephosphorylation. S accharomyces boulardii, a nonpathogenic yeast, exerts therapeutic properties in acute and chronic enterocolopathies, antibiotic-associated diarrhea, and enterotoxigenic Clostridium difficile infections (1-4). In human volunteers (4,5) and in growing rats (4), several studies have documented that oral treatment with a lyophilized preparation of S. boulardii produces trophic intestinal effects, including increases in the activities of BBM enzymes (4,5) and enhanced secretion of s-IgA in intestinal fluid (6). After oral treatment of rats with S. boulardii, there is a marked stimulation of sodium-dependent D-glucose uptake into BBM vesicles with a corresponding accumulation of the sodium D-glucose co-transporter-1 (SGLT-1) (7). These trophic effects are, at least in part, mediated by endoluminal release of polyamines, as yeast cells contain substantial amounts of spermine and spermidine (4,8,9). In a recent work (10), we found that S. boulardii enhanced N-terminal peptide hydrolysis in suckling rat small intestine by endoluminal release of a zinc-binding metalloprotease. In the present study, we have analyzed whether oral treatment with S. boulardii could enhance the endoluminal activity of IAP. We also have purified a protein phosphatase secreted by S. boulardii in the rat intestinal lumen and have compared some of its properties with rat and bovine IAP. Finally, we have assessed whether the protein phosphatase released from S. boulardii can inhibit the toxicity of LPS from O55B5 Escherichia coli by dephosphorylation of its two phosphorylation sites. METHODSMedia and culture conditions. S. boulardii cells were inoculated in YPD (yeast extract, 0.5%; peptone, 2%; glucose, 2%; DIFCO, Detroit, MI) media and were grown at 30°C with moderate shaking to exponential growth as described (10).To disrupt the external capside, yeast cells were concentrated (1.45-1.50 ϫ 10 10...

ABSTRACT. To further document the effect of insulin on intestinal maturation, suckling rats were treated either with exogenous insulin (12.5 mU.g body wt, intraperitoneally, twice daily) or with saline from d 8 to 12 postpartum. Sucrase activity in brush border membrane extracts was precociously induced by insulin, whereas the activities of other brush border membrane enzymes (maltase, aminopeptidase, and neutral lactase) were enhanced (+30 to +131%, p < 0.01 versus controls). The lysosomal enzyme, N-acetyl-8-glucosaminidase, which normally declines at weaning was significantly ( p < 0.025) decreased in both villus (-51%) and crypt cells (-57%) isolated from the jejunum of insulin-treated rats. The microsomal enzyme, sulfatase C, and the cytosolic enzyme, lactate dehydrogenase, were also sensitive to insulin with decreases in activity ranging from -37 to -63% ( p < 0.05) compared to salinetreated control rats. Insulin at doses of 0.5 or 12.5 m u did not influence plasma total corticosterone levels, which were about 9-fold lower in suckling than in 25-d-old weaned rats. In weaned rats (from d 25 to 32) insulin treatment (12.5 mu) failed to influence the activity of brush border membrane hydrolases or of lysosomal, microsomal, and cytosolic enzymes. The synthesis rate of mature sucraseisomaltase, measured in weaned rats (32 d) by the incorporation of I4C-leucine into the enzyme precursor protein, was equivalent in both groups. These data demonstrate that the immature enterocyte of the suckling rat is responsive to insulin, whereas the mature enterocyte of the weaned rat is unresponsive. The effect of insulin on the intestinal cell appears not to be mediated via an endogenous stimulation of corticosterone release. (Pediatr Res 27:161-164,1990) Abbreviations BBM, brush border membrane S-I, sucrase-isomaltase ip, intraperitoneal During the weaning period (d 14 to 21) the rat small intestine undergoes rapid changes in its pattern of enzyme expression.

The mechanism(s) by which insulin enhance prematurely the activity of brush border membrane (BBM) hydrolases in rat immature intestine is unknown. Therefore, we have compared the responses of four BBM enzymes [sucrase-isomaltase (SI), maltase, lactase-phloridzine hydrolase (LPH), and aminopeptidase] with exogenous insulin, the analog B-Asp10, IGF-I, and antireceptor MAb [insulin-receptor (IR) MAb] given to preweaning pups. Low doses of insulin caused a precocious induction of SI and of SI mRNA and stimulated maltase activity without effect on LPH nor on aminopeptidase activities. IGF-I given at the same dose as that of insulin had no detectable effect on these enzymes. Administration to sucklings of IR MAb prevented the effect of endogenous insulin by inhibiting the expression of SI and maltase without effect on LPH activity. B-Asp10, an insulin analogue that exhibits in vitro a 3.5-fold increase in receptor affinity with sustained signaling of the receptor tyrosine kinase, caused an overexpression of SI by 3.5-fold and of maltase by 1.5-fold compared with equivalent doses of normal insulin. The premature increases in SI activity, SI mRNA, and maltase activity in response to insulin were dose-dependent and were associated with dose-dependent increases in intracellular spermine and spermidine concentrations. In conclusion, these data suggest that the premature induction of SI by insulin is mediated by a dose-dependent signal initiated by binding of the hormone to its intestinal receptor, which after transduction into the cell indirectly triggers the transcription of the SI gene, possibly by changes in intracellular polyamine concentrations.

The weanling process is characterized by the transition from a liquid diet poor in iron (rat milk) to a solid diet high in iron (chow pellets). To examine the effects of iron content of the weanling diet on terminal maturation of rat small intestine, suckling pups, nursed by iron-sufficient mothers, were weaned by day 16 onto a solid basal diet that was either deficient [low-iron diet (LID): 0.5 mg iron/100 g solid] or high [high-iron diet (HID) controls: 30 mg iron/100 g solid] in iron. The animals were studied during or at the end of the 4th postnatal wk. By day 17 rats weaned onto the LID exhibited an initial rise in jejunal sucrase activity as did their controls, but the activity plateau of the enzyme was reduced to a level 60% of the controls. On day 28 iron-deprived rats were anemic and showed significant decreases (P less than 0.01 compared with HID rats) in the activity of jejunal sucrase (-57%), neutral lactase (-83%), and maltase (-46%), whereas villus height, crypt depth, mucosal mass parameters, ileal acid beta-galactosidase activity, mucosal protein, and DNA synthesis rates were equivalent in LID and HID groups. The concentration of the secretory component, a glycoprotein synthesized by the intestinal crypt cell, was markedly depressed (P less than 0.01 vs. controls) in the jejunum (-54%) and ileum (-79%) of iron-deprived rats. When D-[1-14C]glucosamine was injected intraperitoneally, incorporation of the label into jejunal and ileal brush-border proteins was two to three times lower for iron-deficient rats than for controls.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)