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Ionic permeability of the mitochondrial outer membrane

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Abstract

The ionic permeability of the outer mitochondrial membrane (OMM) was studied with the patch clamp technique. Electrical recording of intact mitochondria (hence of the outer membrane (OM)), derived from mouse liver, showed the presence of currents corresponding to low conductances (< 50 pS), as well as of four distinct conductances of 99 pS,152 pS, 220 pS and 307 pS (in 150 mM KCl). The latter were voltage gated, being open preferentially at positive (pipette) potentials. Very similar currents were found by patch clamping liposomes containing the isolated OM derived from rat brain mitochondria. Here a conductance of approximately 530 pS, resembling in its electrical characteristics a conductance already attributed to mitochondrial contact sites (Moran et al. 1990), was also detected. Immunoblot assays of mitochondria and of the isolated OM with antibodies against the outer membrane voltage-dependent anion channel (VDAC) (Colombini 1979), showed the presence of the anion channel in each case. However, the typical electrical behaviour displayed by such a channel in planar bilayers could not be detected under our experimental conditions. From this study, the permeability of the OMM appears different from what has been reported hitherto, yet is more in line with that multifarious and dynamic structure which apparently should belong to it, at least within the framework of mitochondrial biogenesis (Pfanner and Neupert 1990).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratorio di Neurofisiologia, Scuola Internazionale Superiore di Studi Avanzati, Trieste, Italy

    Oscar Moran & Marina Sciancalepore

  2. Dipartimento di Biochimica, Biofisica e Chimica delle Macromolecole, Università di Trieste, Trieste, Italy

    Gabriella Sandri & Enrico Panfili

  3. Dipartimento di Biologia, Università di Padova, Padova, Italy

    Roberto Bassi

  4. Dipartimento di Chimica Biologica e Centro del CNR per to Studio della Fisiologia Mitocondriale, Università di Padova, Via Trieste 75, I-35121, Padova, Italy

    Cristina Ballarin & M. Catia Sorgato

Authors
  1. Oscar Moran
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  2. Marina Sciancalepore
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  3. Gabriella Sandri
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  4. Enrico Panfili
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  5. Roberto Bassi
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  6. Cristina Ballarin
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  7. M. Catia Sorgato
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Moran, O., Sciancalepore, M., Sandri, G. et al. Ionic permeability of the mitochondrial outer membrane. Eur Biophys J 20, 311–319 (1992). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00196590

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00196590

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