Iron absorption in normal and iron-deficient beagle dogs: mucosal iron kinetics

Absorption of dietary iron requires uptake of iron by the brush border of the intestinal epithelial cells, intracellular transport, and transfer to the systemic circulation. In iron-deficiency anemia, iron absorption is greatly increased, but the individual steps responsible for this increase have not been identified. We have developed a method to evaluate the rate constants for each of these steps, and we report here our results in beagle dogs a) under normal conditions and b) after phlebotomy to produce iron-deficiency anemia. Simultaneous administration of oral 59Fe3+-citrate and intravenous 55Fe-transferrin was used to investigate the kinetics of mucosal iron transport. Plasma levels of both isotopes and the whole-body excretion pattern of 59Fe were monitored sequentially, and the fractional mucosal transport rates were estimated by nonlinear least-squares fit of a physiologically based mathematical model to these data. Under normal conditions the fractional rate of mucosal iron uptake from the intestinal lumen was rate limiting, being less than 1% of the fractional rate of either iron incorporation into the mucosal storage pool or transfer of iron from the mucosa to the plasma. After induction of iron-deficiency anemia, the fractional mucosal iron uptake rate increased sixfold (P less than 0.005), while the rate of incorporation into the mucosal storage pool decreased ninefold (P less than 0.02); in contrast, the fractional rate of iron transfer to the plasma did not change. These results indicate that the enhanced iron absorption in iron-deficiency anemia is attributable to an increase in mucosal iron available for transfer to the plasma, leading in turn to a net increase in iron absorption, despite a normal fractional transfer rate.