Synaptic and non-synaptic mitochondria from rat cerebral cortex. Characterization and effect of pharmacological treatment on some enzyme activities related to energy transduction.

By a cellular subfractionation technique, synaptic and non-synaptic mitochondria from a single rat cerebral cortex were obtained. In these different mitochondrial populations the activity of citrate synthase, malate dehydrogenase, total NADH-cytochrome c reductase, cytochrome oxidase and glutamate dehydrogenase were evaluated. Except for glutamate dehydrogenase, the enzyme specific activities evaluated in the "free" mitochondrial fraction were higher than those evaluated in the "synaptic" SM1 and SM2 mitochondrial fractions, the differences between SM1 and SM2 fractions being significant. The effect of the in vivo administration of naftidrofuryl given at different doses and at different times was studied. The treatment induced few but different changes in the various mitochondrial populations.