[Quantification of mRNA coding for enterocyte fatty acid binding proteins (FABP) in rats: effect of high lipid diet...

We have tested in adult rat the specificity and the sensitivity of two cDNA probes derived from recombinant plasmids pJG19 and pJG418. The Northern blot analysis of total RNA extracted from small bowel reveals 0.9 and 0.7 kb mRNA corresponding respectively to the I and L-FABPc mRNA. A linear relation occurs between the amounts of input total RNA and the quantities of specific mRNA found by hybridization with cDNA probes (r = 0.991 and r = 0.998 for I and L-FABPc respectively). We have also evaluated the effect of drastic nutritional status: a high fat diet containing 45% of lipids and a starvation of three days. A two fold increase in I and L-FABPc mRNA occurs in starved rats. By contrast, only the I-FABPc mRNA are slightly enhanced after the hyperlipidic diet (50%). These preliminary results, which must be confirmed by further experiments, suggest a differential nutritional regulation of I and L-FABPc gene expression in rat intestine.