Aquaporins: Their role in cholestatic liver disease

Figure 2 Functional expression of AQP8 in normal and cholestatic liver. Superior panel: Immunogold electron microscopy for AQP8 in liver from control (left) and 7-d BDL rats (right). Arrowheads indicate AQP8 in bile canalicular (bc) membranes. Arrows indicate AQP8 in the pericanalicular cytoplasm. The upper inset shows an AQP8-containing vesicle, and the lower insert shows AQP8 in the tip of a microvillus and in the intermicrovillar plasma membrane region. (Original magnification X 60 000) Modified and reproduced with permission[57]. Inferior panel: On the left, anti-AQP8 immunoblot of the canalicular plasma membranes from normal and LPS-induced cholestatic liver. On the right, water permeability assessment of canalicular membranes from LPS-induced cholestatic liver. Typical tracings of a time course of scattered light intensity (osmotic water transport), along with single exponential fits in canalicular plasma membrane vesicles in response to a 250 mosM hypertonic sucrose gradient. Calculated P_f values (μm/s) are shown under each curve. Data are mean ± SE from 3 independent vesicle preparations. ^aP < 0.05 vs conrtol. Modified and reproduced with permission[64].