Kinetics of oxygen consumption after a flash of light in the lateral ocellus of the barnacle.

Until recently, polarographic methods for measuring the time course of transient changes in the rate of oxygen consumption (DeltaQO(2)) have been applied only to tissue preparations containing thousands of cells. Here, we describe DeltaQO(2) measurements on the lateral ocellus of the barnacle (Balanus eburneus) which contains only three photoreceptor cells. The decrement of partial pressure of oxygen (DeltaPO(2)) elicited by an 80 ms flash of light was measured near the cells with a microelectrode and the DeltaQO(2) was calculated from the DeltaPO(2) using a model of diffusion with spherical symmetry. As shown by mathematical simulation, the exact shape of the preparation is not crucial for our measurements of the time course of the DeltaQO(2). For a given DeltaQO(2), the model describes correctly the attenuation of the DeltaPO(2) measured at increased distances from the preparation. To know more about the mechanisms controlling the DeltaQO(2), we compared it with the electrical response of the photoreceptor cells: both responses have a similar spectral dependence, but only the DeltaQO(2) was abolished by a 10-min exposure to 50 muM dinitrophenol or to 3 mM amytal. We conclude that the DeltaQO(2) reflects an increase in mitochondrial respiration and that it is initiated by the phototransformation of rhodopsin, as was already found in the honeybee drone retina (Dimitracos and Tsacopoulos, 1985; Jones and Tsacopoulos, 1987).