Comparison of distribution and metabolism between tellurium and selenium in rats

Metabolism of tellurium, antimony and germanium simultaneously administered to rats

“…This suggests that Te exists in blood cells in bloodstream. Our previous study demonstrated that Te solely administered distributed predominantly to RBCs (Ogra et al, 2008). The amount of accumulated Te in RBCs of singly administered rats was comparable to that of repeatedly administered rats, suggesting that accumulated Te in RBCs underwent turnover or was cleared from RBCs during the interval of 4 days.…”

“…Thus, the chemical forms were ingested in the study. The dose of metalloids was decided on the basis of our previous results (Ogra et al, 2008). Forty-eight hr after administration, the animals were sacinto plain and heparin-coated tubes, and clotted blood in the plain tube was centrifuged at 1,600 x g for 10 min to obtain serum.…”

“…Antimonite was simply oxidized to antimonate, while germanium oxide was not metabo-- tain metalloids, such as Se, Te and As. However, other metalloids, such as Sb and Ge, are not methylated in the body (Naranmandura et al, 2006;Ogra et al, 2008). In particular, it is remarkable that Sb is not methylated in rats that have the highest methylation capacity for As among rodents.…”

“…Indeed, methylation is an alternate metabolic pathway of selenium (Se) in addition to glycosylation (Ogra et al, 2002). In our previous study, we found that Te was also metabolized by methyltransferase, suggesting that Te partly shares the same metabolic pathway with Se (Ogra et al, 2008). Thus, we also evaluated whether these enzymes were induced or not by repeated administration of the metalloids.…”

“…Some clinical manifestations of Te toxicosis are known: nausea, vomiting, garlic breath and garlic odor in sweat are commonly found in Te toxicosis patients (Taylor, 1996). We have reported that the major urinary Te metabolite is trimethyltelluronium (TMTe) and that Te accumulated in red blood cells (RBCs) as a dimethylated Te compound in rats (Ogra et al, 2008). Together, those results suggest that the main route of Te metabolism is methylation.…”