BIOCHEMICAL STUDIES ON L-ASCORBIC ACID IN AQUATIC ANIMALS-II

DISTRIBUTION IN VARIOUS PARTS OF FISH

Abstract

By the hydrazine method improved with a chromatographic treatment as described in the preceding work, the amount of L-ascorbic acid in various tissues of fish was determined. In the muscle and organs of fish tested, a greater portion of ascorbic acid existed as a reduced form, while oxidized ascorbic acid was less than 10 per cent of the total ascorbic acid contained.
In most of sample fish, the brain and the ovary had a greater amount of ascorbic acid than the other anatomical parts, while the level of ascorbic acid was low in the testis, muscle, and gall-bladder. Some species of fish showed the ascorbic acid content in the kidney at much higher a level than did the others. They were ‘ayu’ Plecoglossus altivelis, gold fish, Sparus sarba, Acanthopagrus schlegeli, and amberjack Seriola purpurascens (Table 2).
In order to trace the path of ascorbic acid in fish, 2.5 μc doses of ascorbic acid labeled with C¹⁴ was given to the carp through oral administration or injection. The radioactivity measured in tissues of the fish at various time intervals indicated that the blood and kidney play important roles in distributing ascorbic acid throughout the body of fish (Table 4).