This preclinical study provides support for the near-equilibrium model of mitochondrial respiration controlled at the cytochrome oxidase-oxygen reaction in the heart.
Isolated rat heart was perfused with Langendorff's retrograde perfusion method, while the oxygen consumption and the left ventricular pressure were monitored continually. The steady-state contents of metabolites in the cardiac tissue, freeze clamped under various work-load conditions, were determined and the concentrations of free cytosolic ADP and AMP were calculated from the near equilibrium in creatine phosphokinase and adenylate kinase reactions. Increasing respiratory rate with increasing load was accompanied by a fall in the cytosolic free ATP/ADPPi but little change in the mitochondrial free NAD+/NADH. The free energy of ATP hydrolysis was calculated from the concentrations of the adenine nucleotides and compared with the values computed from the measured turnover number for cytochrome c and redox state of the mitochondrial NAD couple according to a mathematical model. The agreement between the two values was good over a wide range of metabolic conditions, which provides further support for the proposed near-equilibrium model of mitochondrial respiration with control exerted at the cytochrome oxidase-oxygen reaction.
Nishiki et al. (1978) studied this question.