ATP overflow from the mouse isolated vas deferens.

1. A modified form of the highly specific luciferin-luciferase assay was used to measure the overflow of adenosine 5'-triphosphate (ATP) from the field-stimulated mouse vas deferens in vitro. Precise timing of the stimulation, superfusate collection and assay minimized ATP degradation before assay, offering the opportunity for quantitative studies. 2. Stimulation with between 50 and 200 supramaximal pulses at 5 Hz increased ATP overflow by between 7 and 28 times over basal. 3. ATP overflow increased steadily with increasing numbers of stimuli from 50 to 200 pulses. Increasing the frequency of stimulation initially had no effect, but above 10 Hz there was increased overflow, suggesting an interaction between facilitated release and the rate of degradation by extracellular ATPases. 4. Contractions of the vas induced by exogenous (-)-phenylephrine produced only a small increase in ATP overflow, suggesting that the stimulation induced increase in ATP overflow is mostly pre-junctional in origin, though tetrodotoxin eliminated stimulation-induced overflow only in a proportion of preparations.