Respiratory Chain of the Lung Fluke Paragonimus westermani - Facultative Anaerobic Mitochondria

The respiratory chain of adult Paragonimus westermani, a lung fluke, was characterized in isolated mitochondria. The fluke mitochondria exhibited cyanide- and antimycin A-sensitive succinate oxidase activity at a rate of 16.8 nmol O2 min−1 mg−1 protein. The succinate oxidation was shown to be stimulated by ADP and linked to the formation of membrane potential. The specific activities of oxidoreductases composing the succinate oxidase system, i.e., succinate-ubiquinone and succinate-cytochrome c oxidoreductase (complex II and complex II-III, respectively) and cytochrome c oxidase (complex IV), were compared in mitochondria from adult Paragonimus, bovine heart (an aerobic tissue), and muscle of adult Ascaris suum which possesses an anaerobic respiratory chain. The activity values of complex II-III and complex IV were high, middle, and low for bovine heart, Paragonimus, and A. suum, respectively, whereas the activity of complex II was comparable among the three sources. The cytochrome contents of Paragonimus mitochondria as determined by difference absorption spectrophotometry ranged between those in Ascaris and bovine mitochondria for types c and aa3 cytochromes. Paragonimus mitochondria exhibited a high activity of NADH-fumarate reductase; the specific activity was about 18-fold higher in fluke submitochondria than in bovine heart submitochondria. Quinone analysis by HPLC and mass spectrometry showed that the fluke mitochondria contain both rhodoquinone-10 and ubiquinone-10 at concentrations of 0.572 and 0.321 nmol mg−1 mitochondrial protein, respectively. These data clearly show that mitochondria from adult P. westermani, unlike adult Ascaris mitochondria, possess both cyanide-sensitive succinate oxidase and NADH-fumarate reductase systems, indicating that the fluke mitochondria are facultatively anaerobic.