The present study was conducted to assess the functional characteristics of human organic cation transporter 1 (hOCT1) for the transport of 4',6-diamidino-2-phenylindol (DAPI), a fluorescent compound that may be used as a probe substrate for rapid assays of its functionality. The specific uptake of DAPI by hOCT1 heterologously introduced into Madin-Darby canine kidney II cells by stable transfection was found to be, when assessed by DAPI-derived fluorescence intensity, rapid and saturable with a Michaelis constant of 8.94 µM, indicating that DAPI is a good substrate of hOCT1. The specific uptake of DAPI was insensitive to the membrane potential and extracellular pH, indicating a mode of operation different from that for typical cationic substrates such as tetraethylammonium (TEA), for which hOCT1 has been suggested to be driven by an inside-negative membrane potential and favor higher pH for optimal operation. However, many organic cations were found to inhibit the specific DAPI uptake with extents well correlated with those of inhibition of the specific uptake of [(14) C]TEA, indicating comparable performances of both substrates as probes in identifying inhibitors. Thus, DAPI can be an alternative probe substrate that enables fluorometric rapid assays of the functionality of hOCT1.
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