Changes in free aminoacid contents of erithrocytes and leukocytes during pregnancy

Erythrocyte participation in the transfer and exchange of amino acids with tissues has been recently demonstrated. In this study, we show changes in erythrocytes, leukocytes and plasma free amino acid content, from peripheral blood in a group of 10 women after 25 weeks of gestation. Also tryptophan determinations in plasma and erythrocytes were made by fluorometric methods. During pregnancy, eleven of the 21 plasma amino acids studied are significantly different and the essential/nonessential ratio is not modified, although the total content diminished significantly. Conversely, in erythrocytes and leukocytes results indicate increase a in 2 and 3 fold respectively, in contents of aminoacid during gestation. The essential/nonessential ratio increases in the erythrocyte; In the essentials amino acids threonine, isoleucine and histidine show a greater increase. In leukocytes, the essential/nonessential ratio decreases during gestation due to a great increase of nonessentials, nevertheless, threonine, valine, methionine and leucine also show values significantly higher values during pregnancy. When amino acid content is calculated by mg of protein we see a certain increase in plasma, not significant, during pregnancy; in leukocytes, this increase corresponds almost to 90 per-cent with respect to the control group.