Distribution of kidney kininogenases.

The distribution of kininogenase activity in the dog kidney was studied. It was found that kininogenase decreased from the outer to the inner cortex and that the medulla and papilla have very little kininogenase activity. Kininogenase activity was also measured in isolated glomeruli devoid of juxtaglomerular apparatus and in the total cortex of rat kidney. In the isolated glomeruli, the kininogenase activity per milligram of protein was only 15% of that found in the total cortex. It was concluded that the main localization of these enzymes is not in the glomeruli, but somewhere else in the cortical segment of the nephron.