Inositol Cycling and Phosphoinositide Metabolism in Rat Pancreatic Islets.

The effects of extracellular inositol and LiCl on intra-islet inositol cycling were investigated in isolated rat islets. Islets were cultured for 7 days in inositol-free RPMI 1640 containing 11.1mM glucose and labeled with 3.7MBq myo-[2-3H] inositol for the final 3days. The labeled islets were then perifused under various conditions. There was a persistent increase in [3H] efflux from labeled islets stimulated with 16.7mM glucose for 60 min. Addition of 5mM inositol resulted in marked release of [3H] from islets and a decrease in radioactive inositol-lipid. When islets were perifused with 5mM LiCl, the glucose-induced efflux of [3H] was greatly inhibited. The inhibitory effect of LiCI on [3H] efflux was partially corrected by the addition of 5mM inositol. A prominent effect of LiCl was an increase in inositol monophosphate, indicating increased phospholipase C activity. This was detected within 5 min after glucose stimulation. The present data suggest that there is always very active intra-islet inositol cycling and that glucose can augument inositol-lipid metabolism.