Brain methanethiol and ammonia concentrations in experimental hepatic coma and coma induced by injections of various combinations of these substances.

In normal rats in a coma induced by NH+4 alone or by methanethiol alone, the brain and blood levels of ammonia or methanethiol are much higher than those observed in rats in experimental hepatic coma. When various smaller dosage combinations of NH+4, methanethiol, and octanoic acid were injected simultaneously, coma occurred at lower brain and blood concentrations of ammonia and methanethiol. Brain ammonia and methanethiol concentrations in normal rats receiving 0.75 mmol NH+4 plus 0.15 mmol octanoic acid plus 18 mumol methanethiol were comparable with those observed in 24 rats in hepatic coma after fulminant hepatic failure caused by acute massive ischemic liver necrosis. The normal rats became comatose. In these rats and in the rats in hepatic coma, the ammonia level in the brain was increased threefold and the methanethiol level in the brain was increased fivefold. Because these levels of ammonia and methanethiol were sufficient to induce coma in normal rats, they should also have been sufficient to induce coma in rats with damaged livers. Therefore, the accumulation of ammonia and methanethiol in the central nervous system after the acute massive ischemic necrosis may have been sufficient to account for the coma that ensued, without the involvement of other factors.