Free radicals are the compounds having one or more unpaired electrons in their outer orbital and this unpaired electron make these compounds very reactive. Especially as their concentration increases, they initiate a chain oxidation reaction of lipids, proteins and nucleic acids. The condition, in which the production of free radicals exceeds their elimination or tissue defense mechanism decrease against them or both occur together, is called oxidative stress. In diabetes mellitus which is a glucose metabolism disorder, there occurs excessive non-enzymatic protein oxidation, glucose autoxidation and enhanced activity of polyol pathway enzymes, which are the possible sources of the oxidative stress in this disease.
In this study, the conditions of the activity measurements of major antioxidant enzymes, namely superoxide dismutase (SOD, EC 1.15.1.1), catalase (CAT, EC 1.11.1.6), glutathione peroxidase (GPx, 1.11.1.9) and glutathione S-transferase (GST, EC 2.5.1.18) were studied and the optimum conditions (pH, temperature and substrate concentrations) for each assay were determined.
Further objectives of the study were to characterize the enzymatic antioxidant systems (catalase, superoxide dismutase, glutathione peroxidase and glutathione S-transferase), tissue oxidation status (concentrations of TBARS, protein carbonylation, and lipid/protein ratios) and nonenzymatic antioxidant (reduced glutathione) levels of the diabetic rat liver tissues.
According to our results, the hepatic SOD and GPx activities significantly increased whereas CAT activity markedly decreased in diabetic rats compared to control group. Also, GST activities did not change in diabetes. As a result of oxidative stress, TBARS concentration, lipid/protein ratios and protein carbonylation increased and GSH levels decreased in diabetic rats compared to control rats. This increase in tissue damage, in spite of the increase in antioxidant enzyme activities, could have been due to the overproduction of reactive oxygen species that exceeded the capacity of the antioxidant enzymes during the eight week of diabetes.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:METU/oai:etd.lib.metu.edu.tr:http://etd.lib.metu.edu.tr/upload/2/12605254/index.pdf |
| Date | 01 September 2004 |
| Creators | Sadi, Gokhan |
| Contributors | Guray, Tulin |
| Publisher | METU |
| Source Sets | Middle East Technical Univ. |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | M.S. Thesis |
| Format | text/pdf |
| Rights | To liberate the content for public access |
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