FASTING AND GLUCONEOGENESIS IN THE KIDNEY OF THE EVISCERATED RAT

Abstract

Fasting resulted in an addition of glucose to the blood by the kidney of the eviscerated rat, as detd. by analyses of simultaneous aortal-renal vein samples for glucose. This phenomenon could not be related to any difference in total oxidative metabolism. The precursors of the glucose added do not seem to be blood amino acids. The previously demonstrated ability of the fasted rat to maintain high levels of blood sugar for many hrs. after evisceration (Am. J. Physiol. 141: 476, 1944) appears to be at least partly due to this stimulation of renal gluconeogenesis, which is essentially absent in the fed eviscerate. Glucogenesis could not be demonstrated in the kidney of intact animals subjected to periods of fasting similar to those undergone by the above animals prior to evisceration.