Abstract
The $Na^+-and\;K^+-induced\;Ca^{++}$ release was measured isotopically by millipore filter technique in pig heart mitochondria. With EGTA-quenching technique, the characteristics of mitochondrial $Ca^{++}-pool$ and the sources of $Ca^{++}$ released from mitochondria by $Na^+\;or\;K^+$ were analyzed. The mitochondrial $Ca^{++}-pool$ could be distinctly divided into two components: internal and external ones which were represented either by uptake through inner membrane, or by energy independent passive binding to external surface of mitochondria, respectively. In energized mitochondria, a large portion of $Ca^{++}$was transported into internal pool with little external binding, while in de-enerigzed state, a large portion of transported $Ca^{++}$ existed in the external pool with limited amount of $Ca^{++}$ in the internal pool which was possibly transported through the $Ca^{++}-carrier$ present in the inner membrane. $Na^+$ induced the $Ca^{++}$ release from both internal pool and external pool and external binding pool of mitochondria. In contrast, $K^+$ did not affect $Ca^{++}$ of the internal pool, but, displaced $Ca^{++}$ bound to external surface of the mitochondria. When the $Ca^{++}-reuptake$ was blocked by EGTA, the $Ca^{++}$ release from the internal pool by $Na^+$ was rapid; the rate of $Ca^{++}-efflux$ appeared to be a function of $[Na^+]^2$ and about 8mM $Na^+$ was required to elicit half-maximal velocity of $Ca^{++}-efflux$. So it was revealed that $Ca^{++}-efflux$ velocity was particulary sensitive to small changes of the $Na^+$ concentration in physiological range. Energy independent $Ca^{++}-binding$ sites of mitochondrial external surface showed unique characteristics. The total number of external $Ca^{++}-binding$ sites of pig heart mitochondria was 29 nmoles per mg protein and the dissociation constant(Kd) was $34{\mu}M$. The $Ca^{++}-binding$ to the external sites seemed to be competitively inhibited by $Na^+\;and\;K^+$; the inhibition constant(Ki) were 9.7 mM and 7.1 mM respectively. Considering the intracellular ion concentrations and large proportion of $Ca^{++}$ uptake in energized mitochondria, the external $Ca^{++}-binding$ pool of the mitochondria did not seem to play a significant role on the regulation of intracellular free $Ca^{++}$ concentration. From this experiment, it was suggested that a small change of intracellular free $Na^+$ concentration might play a role on regulation of free $Ca^{++}$ concentration in cardiac cell by influencing $Ca^{++}-efflux$ from the internal pool of mitochondria.
(Dept. of Pharmacology, College of Medicine, Seoul National University)