Separate Transport Systems for Sugars and Amino Acids in Developing Rat Kidney Cortex

The ability of renal cortical slices of newborn and young rats to accumulate a nonmetabolizable sugar, alpha-methylglucoside, is slight and does not reach adult capacity until 25 days of age. However, a rudimentary sugar transport system is present, as indicated by a further decrease in accumulation in the presence of phlorizin or absence of sodium ion.Amino acid uptake in immature kidney tissue is not deficient; on the contrary, the tissue took up and concentrated more glycine and lysine than adult tissue. Decreased amino acid efflux from the immature cells appears to be the explanation. Concentration dependence of amino acid uptake was the same in 5-day-old and adult tissue. These differences between the transport characteristics of a model sugar and representative amino acids during development indicate separate transport systems for the two types of substrate.