The effect of age upon the influx of glucose into the brain

1. Rats aged from 1 to 116 weeks were studied. 2. Influx of glucose into the brain is low in suckling rats but rises after weaning, to reach its highest level in the young adult, thenceforward declining slowly as age increases. 3. The blood-brain barrier for glucose is fully developed in the rat by the age of 18 days and glucose enters the brain, at this stage, by carrier-mediated transport, as in the adult. 4. The results show that the low influx of glucose into the brain of the suckling animal is due to a low maximum rate of transport of glucose rather than to a low affinity of the carrier-molecule for glucose. 5. In the young adult rat, efflux of glucose back from the brain into the blood is greater than in either the suckling or the old animals. Thus the margin of safety, i.e. the extent to which the blood glucose can be reduced without affecting the utilization of glucose by the brain, is highest in the young adult. 6. The lower margin of safety in the suckling animals is compensated for by the high influx of the ketone bodies which provide an alternative source of energy at this age. In the old animals there is no alternative source of energy, so that the older brain is at greatest risk in hypoglycaemia.