title: Oxidation of 14C-labeled substrates by hippocampal slice cultures.
abstract: In vitro studies of glucose and lactate utilization have been performed in acute hippocampal slices or dissociated neurons and glia. While some studies concluded that lactate and glucose are equivalent substrates to support evoked synaptic activity, others showed decreased synaptic activity in the presence of lactate as compared to glucose. We found diminished neural activity in the presence of lactate in hippocampal slice cultures. We developed a method to examine the oxidation rates of 14C-labeled substrates by hippocampal slice cultures. The rate of 14CO2 production from either 14C-glucose or 14C-lactate remained unchanged for 6 h suggesting that slice cultures are metabolically stable. While the glucose oxidation rate saturated between 2.8 and 10 mM, lactate oxidation rate had not saturated at 10 mM. These data suggest that organotypic slice cultures provide a method to examine elements of cerebral metabolism in vitro.
authors.affiliation: Program in Neural and Behavioral Science, State University New York-Downstate Medical Center, 450 Clarkson Avenue, Brooklyn, New York 11203, USA.
authors.forename: Erin
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Gilbert
authors.forename: Peter J
authors.initials: PJ
authors.lastname: Bergold
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D002250:Carbon Radioisotopes; D006624:Hippocampus / Q000378:metabolism*; D009924:Organ Culture Techniques / Q000379:methods; D010084:Oxidation-Reduction; D051381:Rats; D017207:Rats, Sprague-Dawley
chemical_list: D002250:Carbon Radioisotopes