This study elucidates the in uiuo metabolic response of different liver cells after a single phagocytic chal- Ienge. In uiuo glucose uptake of different tissues and isolated liver cells was determined by a sequential double labeling version of the 2-deoxyglucose technique. After latex administration, glucose uptake more than doubled in the liver, increased by about 50% in the spleen and lung and was not changed in muscle and testis. Within 10 min after intravenous injection of latex beads, neutropenia developed, with no change in the number of lymphocytes. This was accompanied by a marked influx of polymorphonuclear leukocytes into the liver. Latex was found in 52%, 35%, and 14% of the isolated Kupffer cells, polymorphonuclear leukocytes and endothelial cells, respectively. In uivo glucose uptake increased by Ill%, 142%, and 43% in these cells. Glucose uptake by the latex-free hepatocytes was also elevated, presumably by way of intercellular signals between parenchymal and non-parenchymal liver cells. Indomethacin pretreatment resulted in the delay of neutrophil immigration into tissues without any change in the glucose response of different liver cells.
Thus phagocytic stimulation in uiuo results in marked neutropenia, migration of neutrophils into the liver, increased glucose uptake by phagocytic cells of the liver and enhanced glucose metabolism by the nonphagocytic parenchymal cells. (HEPATOLOGY 1991;13:277-281.) The sinusoidal cells of the mammalian liver, which are responsible for the clearance of a wide variety of substances (e.g., proteins, toxic materials, bacteria and bacterial products) from the bloodstream, represent a major part of the reticuloendothelial system (1, 2). Elimination of foreign substances can be accompanied by priming or full activation of the cells, which is part of the normal host defense (3-5). Earlier we demonstrated the in vivo increase of glucose use in macrophage-rich tissues in the endotoxemic rat (6) and showed that the increased glucose uptake by the liver is primarily due to the elevated glucose use of Kupffer cells and the