(Na,K)-ATPase and Ouabain binding in reticulocytes from dogs with high K and low K erythrocytes and their changes during maturation.

The present study demonstrated that dog reticulocytes had considerable amounts of (Na,K)-ATPase, but lost it rapidly during maturation into erythrocytes. Furthermore, reticulocytes from dogs possessing erythrocytes characterized with high (Na,K)-ATPase activity and high K, low Na concentrations (HK dogs; Maede, Y., Inaba, M., and Taniguchi, N. (1983) Blood 61,493-499) had more ouabain binding sites than cells from normal dogs (LK dogs). Our results were as follows: i) The maximal binding capacities (Bmax) for ouabain binding at equilibrium were approximately 0 and 1,500 binding sites/cell in LK and HK dog erythrocytes, respectively. ii) Reticulocytes from LK dogs possess approximately 5,700 ouabain binding sites/cell. iii) The Bmax value for ouabain in HK reticulocytes was about 10,000 sites/cell, being 2-fold that in LK reticulocytes. iv) Ouabain-sensitive fluxes of 24Na and 42K in each type of reticulocyte were compatible with the number of ouabain binding sites on the cells. v) Ouabain binding capacity, as well as (Na,K)-ATPase activity, in the reticulocytes from LK dogs fell rapidly to nearly zero during the maturation into erythrocytes. vi) Although reticulocytes from HK dogs also showed a similar regression of (Na,K)-ATPase during maturation, they retained a certain number of ouabain binding sites even after maturation, resulting in the high activity of (Na,K)-ATPase in HK erythrocyte membrane.