Alveolar liquid clearance in multiple nonperfused canine lung lobes

Grimme, John D., Susan M. Lane, and Michael B. Maron.Alveolar liquid clearance in multiple nonperfused canine lung lobes. J. Appl. Physiol. 82(1):348-353, 1997.We evaluated the ability of canine isolatednonperfused lung lobes to absorb fluid from their air spaces bysimultaneously measuring alveolar liquid clearance (ALC) in three lobesremoved from the same dog. Autologous plasma was instilled in the airspaces of each lobe, and the increase in plasma protein concentrationresulting from fluid reabsorption was used to calculate ALC. ALC after4 h was 16.5 ± 0.6% (SE) of the instilled fluid volume underbaseline conditions and was 30.2 ± 1.3% after terbutaline(10⁵ M) administration.These values were similar to those previously reported for intact dogs.Propranolol (10⁴ M) andouabain (10³ M) reduced ALCin terbutaline-stimulated lobes to 20.4 ± 0.8 and 3.9 ± 1.4%,respectively. There was no significant difference in ALC among thethree lobes under either baseline conditions or after terbutalineadministration. These data indicate that the sodium and water transportmechanisms of the canine alveolar epithelium remain viable during 4 hof nonperfusion and that there are no intrinsic differences in thetransport properties of individual lung lobes. The ability to studyseveral lobes simultaneously without the need for perfusion will allowfor the design of experiments in which multiple interventions can bestudied by using lung lobes from the same animal.