The transport systems such as the mitochondrial/cytosolic shuttles are important for the integrating functions of the brain in development. To facilitate their study and to know the rol that these transport systems could have in cerebral cells, radioactive tracers in primary cultured have been used. In this work the oxidation (respiration) and lipogenic rates were evaluated using lactate which is the main cerebral substrate during the presucking in astrocytes in primary cultured, being focused in determinating the minimal inhibitors concentrations that interact with the main shuttles without toxic effects on tested cells; these concentrations must allow us to observe metabolic effects at the same time. Uses of L-[U-14C]-lactato (1 MCi), L-lactato (10.5 mM) in absence and presence of different concentrations of enzymatic inhibitors as dichloroacetate (DCA), an inhibitor of pyruvate dehydrogenase kinase and aminooxyacetate (AOA), an inhibitor of aspartate aminotransferase and inhibitors of the mitochondrial transport like butylmalonate (BM), an inhibitor of the dicarboxilic acid transport and specifically of L-malate and the 1,2,3-benzene tricarboxylate (BT) an inhibitor of the tricarboxilic acid transport. The results suggest that concentrations of 1 mM of DCA and of 5 mM of AOA, BM and BT are enough to evaluate the metabolic effects in cerebral cells during the perinatal period.
