Abstract. We have studied the effects of brefeldin A (BFA) on endocytosis and intracellular traffic in polarized MDCK cells by using the galactose-binding protein toxin ricin as a membrane marker and HRP as a marker of fluid phase transport. We found that BFA treatment rapidly increased apical endocytosis of both ricin and HRP, whereas basolateral endocytosis was unaffected, as was endocytosis of HRP in the poorly polarized carcinoma cell lines HEp-2 and T47D. Tubular endosomes were induced by BFA both apically and basolaterally in some MDCK cells, comparable with those seen in HEp-2 and T47D cells. In addition, in MDCK cells, BFA induced formation of small (<300 nm) vesicles, labeled both after apical and basolateral uptake of HRP, as well as some very large (>700 nm) vacuoles, which were only labeled when HRP was present in the apical medium. In contrast, neither in MDCK nor in HEp-2 or T47D cells, did BFA have any effect on lysosomal morphology. Moreover, transcytosis in the basolateral-apical direction was stimulated both for HRP and ricin. Other vesicular transport routes were less affected or unaffected by BFA treatment. Two closely related structural analogues of BFA (B16 and B21), unable to produce the changes in Golgi and endosomal morphology seen after BFA treatment in a number of different cell lines, were also unable to mimic the effects of BFA on MDCK ceils. well documented effect of the fungal metabolite brefeldin A (BFA) ~ on mammalian ceils is rapid dissociation of proteins associated with the cytosolic face of the Golgi apparatus (7-9), and a subsequent retrograde movement of components of the cis-, medial, and trans-Golgi stacks back into the ER (6,10,17,18,24). However, markers of the trans-Golgi network (TGN), do not move along to the ER upon BFA treatment (5,6,18,32).Recently, it was reported that BFA transforms the morphology of endosomes, lysosomes, and the TGN in normal rat kidney (NRK) cells into more tubular structures (19,44). Studies on the distribution of the TGN 38-protein have shown that BFA treatment may also give a more compact TGN 38 immunofluorescence around the microtubule organizing center (19,28).Two kidney epithelial cell lines (PtK and MDCK) have Golgi stacks that appear to be morphologically resistant to BFA (15,16,32). However, BFA treatment does cause formation of tubular endosomes in both cell lines, suggesting that the effect of BFA on endosomes is not directly coupled to the effect on the Golgi apparatus (15,19).In MDCK cells there are two distinct populations of early endosomes localized close to the apical and the basolateral surface domains, respectively. Markers of apical and baso-1. Abbreviations used in this paper: BFA, brefeldin A; TGN, trans-Golgi network; TER, transepithelial resistance. lateral endocytosis are therefore initially separated, before they enter mannose-6-phosphate receptor-rich late endosomes and lysosomes shared by the two pathways (3,26,42). Early apical and early basolateral endosomes display differences in their fusion machineries and in t...