Effect of anoxia, glucose and thioglycollate on anaphylactic and compound 48/80-induced histamine release in isolated rat mast cells.

Histamine release by antigen from rat mast cells was strongly inhibited by prolonged anoxia. The inhibition was reversed by oxygen and by glucose. Thioglycollate in low concentration potentiated histamine release and in high concentration inhibited it. The effects of anoxia and thioglycollate are additive: inhibition was produced by a low concentration of thioglycollate combined with a short incubation in nitrogen. This inhibition was reversed by glucose and became a potentiation. The effects of anoxia, glucose and thioglycollate on histamine release by compound 48/80 were quantitatively similar to those on histamine release by antigen. These results are consistent with the view that two opposing mechanisms are at work: a freeing of tissue SH groups which potentiates the anaphylactic mechanism and a disruption of tissue S—S bonds which inhibits it. Oxygen lack may inhibit by a reduction of S—S bonds as well as by an exhaustion of metabolic stores.