D-Lactate transport and metabolism in rat liver mitochondria

In the present study we investigated whether isolated rat liver mitochondria can take up and metabolize D-lactate. We found the following: (1) externally added D-lactate causes oxygen uptake by mitochondria [P/O ratio (the ratio of mol of ATP synthesized to mol of oxygen atoms reduced to water during oxidative phosphorylation)=2] and membrane potential (Delta(psi)) generation in processes that are rotenone- insensitive, but inhibited by antimycin A and cyanide, and proton release from coupled mitochondria inhibited by alpha-cyanocinnamate, but not by phenylsuccinate; (2) the activity of the putative flavoprotein (D-lactate dehydrogenase) was detected in inside-out submitochondrial particles, but not in mitochondria and mitoplasts, as it is localized in the matrix phase of the mitochondrial inner membrane; (3) three novel separate translocators exist to mediate D-lactate traffic across the mitochondrial inner membrane: the D-lactate/H(+) symporter, which was investigated by measuring fluorimetrically the rate of endogenous flavin reduction, the D- lactate/oxoacid antiporter (which mediates both the D-lactate/pyruvate and D-lactate/oxaloacetate exchanges) and D-lactate/malate antiporter studied by monitoring photometrically the appearance of the D-lactate counteranions outside mitochondria. The D-lactate translocators, in the light of their different inhibition profiles separate from the monocarboxylate carrier, were found to differ from each other in the V (max) values and in the inhibition and pH profiles and were shown to regulate mitochondrial D-lactate metabolism in vitro. The D-lactate translocators and the D-lactate dehydrogenase could account for the removal of the toxic methylglyoxal from cytosol, as well as for D-lactate- dependent gluconeogenesis.