Summary
The minimal size of active membrane fragments from sonic homogenates of a Nitrobacter cell suspension is about 22 mμ. Nitrite oxidizing activity is absent from particles smaller than that although the distribution of cytochrome a, a link in the respiratory chain responsible for nitrite oxidation, does not show any abnormality below the critical size indicated.
Two independent estimates of the parameters of the cumulative distribution function for particle size in sonic homogenates have been made using either statistics from electron micrographs or sedimentation pattern observed after density gradient centrifugation. The distribution function was found to be of the log-normal type which was considered to be a consequence of the observed kinetics of sonic comminution. Another estimate of the parameters of the distribution function was made by fixed angle centrifugation, a method much less accurate with respect to size determination but which allowed a rapid estimate of nitrite oxidizing capacity remaining in particles smaller than the given size.
Results from the first two determinations of the distribution function for particle size and of its parameters were then used for correcting the error in the estimate of the critical size from the activity found in supernatants from centrifugations in fixed angle rotors.
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Tsien, HC., Laudelout, H. Minimal size of Nitrobacter membrane frangments retaining nitrite oxidizing activity. Archiv. Mikrobiol. 61, 280–291 (1968). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00446613
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00446613