Wen Nie;Feiran Xu;Kai Zhou;Jieying Deng;Ying Wang;Baocai Xu

Engineering

Jinhua;ham;KRQKYD(Lys-Arg-Gln-Lys-Tyr-Asp);Environmental;stability;Gastrointestinal;digestive;Transport;mechanism

The study evaluated the stability of an oligopeptide(Lys-Arg-Gln-Lys-Tyr-Asp,KRQKYD)and its transport mechanism by simulating gastrointestinal digestion and a model of human intestinal Caco-2 monolayer cells in vitro.In this study,the effects of environmental factors(temperature,pH and NaCl concentration)and simulated gastrointestinal digestion on the stability of KRQKYD were evaluated by indicators of the levels of alanine transaminase(ALT),aspartate transaminase(AST)and malondialdehyde(MDA)in an alcoholinduced hepatocyte injury model.The results showed that KRQKYD still maintained satisfactory hepatocyteprotective activity after treatment with different temperatures(20-80℃),pH(3.0-9.0),NaCl concentration(1%-7%)and simulated gastrointestinal digestion,which indicated that KRQKYD showed good stability to environmental factors and simulated gastrointestinal digestion.Furthermore,the intact KRQKYD could be absorbed in a model of Caco-2 monolayer cells with a P_appvalue of(9.70±0.53)*10^-7cm/s.Pretreatment with an energy inhibitor(sodium azide),a competitive peptide transporter inhibitor(Gly-Pro)and a transcytosis inhibitor wortmannin did not decrease the level of transepithelial KRQKYD transport,indicating that the transport mechanism of KRQKYD was not associated with energy dependent,vector mediated and endocytosis.The tight junction disruptor cytochalasin D significantly increased the level of transepithelial KRQKYD transport(P<0.05),suggesting that intact KRQKYD was absorbed by paracellular transport.