Quantitative succinate-dehydrogenase histochemistry

✍ Scribed by Chr. W. Pool; H. Moll; P. C. Diegenbach

• Book ID: 104786748
• Publisher: Springer
• Year: 1979
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 372 KB
• Volume: 64
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 1432-119X
• DOI: 10.1007/bf00495027

✦ Synopsis

The variation in histochemical SDH-activity at different levels in the same muscle fibre was determined in muscle fibre cross-sections both by visual classification and quantitative determination of the formazan-deposits. This work resulted in a confirmation of the earlier micro-biochemical studies of Spamer and Pette (1977, 1979) and Lowrey et al. (1978) that the activity of enzymes of the citric acid cycle is not homogeneously distributed in a muscle fibre over its entire length. In addition it is shown that the observed variations in histochemical SDH-activity strongly interfere with the visual muscle fibre typing. Some of the possible causes for these variations in histochemical SDH-activity (section-thickness, presence of the motor-endplate) and the implications of these findings for the relation between histochemical characteristics and functional properties of the muscle fibres are briefly discussed.