Influence of fried meat and fiber on cytochrome P-450 mediated activity and excretion of mutagens in rats

Fried meat was included in the diet of Sprague-Dawley rats during one week. Ingested and excreted amounts of mutagenic activity were determined daily by the use of the Ames' Salmonella/mammalian microsome test on extracts of the diet, urine and feces. In addition, the effect of the fried meat on ethoxyresorufin-O-deethylase activity in the small intestine and in the liver was measured. The results were compared to those from a control group of rats receiving boiled instead of fried meat as their source of protein. The diet containing boiled meat was not mutagenic and none of the samples from the control group, neither urine nor feces, contained any mutagenicity. The activity of ethoxyresorufin O-deethylase in the small intestine was increased by fried meat whereas this enzyme activity in the liver was unaffected. O-deethylation of ethoxyresorufin is catalyzed by cytochrome P-450 dependent enzyme(s) and induction of the enzyme activity might indicate an increased metabolic activation of premutagens and precarcinogens in the intestine. It is not yet known whether the mutagens excreted by the animals receiving the fried meat diet represent unmetabolized dietary mutagens or are formed as a result of metabolic activation of compounds in fried food. Dietary fibers i.e. wheat bran, pectin, cellulose or ViSiblin were included in the above-described diets and were shown to lower the mutagenic activity in urine and feces of the rats. Pectin significantly increased the hepatic ethoxyresorufin-O-deethylase and decreased the 16 alpha-hydroxylation of 4-androstene-3,17-dione.