A rapid method for the estimation of amino acid concentration in liver tissue

A method for the estimation of amino acid content in tissue samples is presented. The frozen samples are homogenized in a water/acetone mixture (1 : 1.2, v/v) kept at temperatures below 0 degrees C, and the supernatants are used for amino acid estimation (without further elimination of the deproteinizing agent) with the use of radioactive dansyl chloride and thin-layer chromatographic separation. The procedure of homogenization effectively releases all amino acids from the tissue, as the sonication of the homogenates does not increase the amino acid yield. The amino acid content of the female rat liver is presented, showing the considerable abundance of the gluconeogenic amino acids and taurine with respect to the other individual amino acids.