Anomeric specificity of liver glycogenolysis.

In rat liver slices incubated in the absence of exogenous D-glucose, both the basal and glucagon-stimulated output of D-glucose resulted in the production of a greater relative amount of alpha-D-glucose than that found at anomeric equilibrium. Comparable results were obtained in isolated hepatocytes. In these experiments, the rate of glycogenolysis largely exceeded that of glycogen synthesis. These findings indicate that liver glycogenolysis represents an alpha-stereospecific process.