Effect of cold preservation and reperfusion injury on early-stage bile salt secretion after liver transplantation in rat model

Abstract

To explore the effect of cold preservation and reperfusion injury (CPRI) on the bile salt spectrum in rat orthotopic liver transplantation (OLT) model. A special analysis method was established to investigate the bile salts in rat by reverse phase high performance liquid chromatography (RP-HPLC). Rats were randomly divided into 3 groups: group A (control group, n = 6), group B (group with 1 h graft preservation pre-OLT, n = 6) and group C (group with 12 h graft preservation pre-OLT, n = 6). The bile samples of 0 - 14 post-transplantation days were analyzed by RP-HPLC. Eleven kinds of bile salts were detected in rat bile. It showed that CPRI could influence the concentration of bile salts significantly in rat model after OLT, the concentration of hydrophobic bile salts (TCA and TCDCA) increased significantly in group B and C. However, the concentration of hydrophilic bile salts (TUDCA and THDCA) just increased in a short-time. The hydrophobicity index (HI) wasn't significantly changed during the first 4 post-transplant days. Thus the HI of bile salts elevated gradually from the 5th day and reached the peak at the 10th day after OLT. The increase of the proportion of hydrophobic bile salts may be one of the major factors leading to the increase of bile toxicity after OLT.