Primary and reversible injury of H(+)-ATPase in warm ischemia and reperfusion of rat liver in relation to intramitochondrial adenine nucleotide.

The injury and recovery processes of complex reactions of liver mitochondrial ATP synthesis during warm ischemia and after reflow were studied separately in terms of the changes in oxidation (electron transfer system) and phosphorylation (H(+)-ATPase). Oxidative activity decreased significantly from the control value of 40 +/- 0.9 (mean +/- SEM, n = 5) to 31.5 +/- 1.13 (nanoatoms oxygen consumed/min/mg protein) after 40 min of warm ischemia, while phosphorylative activity decreased significantly from the control value of 1.06 +/- 0.12 to 0.42 +/- 0.03 (mumole ATP hydrolyzed/min/mg protein) after 20 min of warm ischemia. During 120 min of reflow after 20 min of warm ischemia, the decreased phosphorylation activity recovered to 0.52 +/- 0.01 concomitant with a recovery of intramitochondrial total adenine nucleotide and an increase in the ATP/ADP ratio, while oxidative activity decreased further to 23.9 +/- 0.81. These results indicate that H(+)-ATPase is more vulnerable to warm ischemia than the electron transfer system, but that it is restored concomitant with the recovery of intramitochondrial adenine nucleotide content.