Abstract
Taurine, a sulfur amino acid abundant in brain of the fetus and early day neonate, has been postulated to play a major role in mediating the immature brain's unusually high buffering ability for lactic acidosis reported previously. In this study, we directly investigated this 'taurine effect' using a l0-day-old rat pup model and multinuclear (31P and 1H) nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) in-vivo spectroscopy. Brain of taurine-supplemented pups exhibited significantly higher acid buffering ability against lactic acidosis than age-matched control pups. The study supports the hypothesis that high levels of free cytosolic taurine increase the brain's ability to buffer against lactic acidosis.
Original language | English (US) |
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Pages (from-to) | 325-328 |
Number of pages | 4 |
Journal | NeuroReport |
Volume | 2 |
Issue number | 6 |
State | Published - 1991 |
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Neuroscience(all)