In crude rat cardiac membrane preparations, could be differentiated into two classes of receptors showing similarities with peripheral presynaptic and postsynaptic aadrenoceptors. This distinction was made possible by labeling a-adrenocept6rs with 3H-DHE in the presence of various aadrenergic antagonists known to interact preferentially with either presynaptic or postsynaptic receptors. We now report the use of a similar binding technique to show the presence of a-adrenoceptors in a rat heart membrane preparation with the properties of presynaptic and postsynaptic receptors whose existence had been suggested by various pharmacological experiments (1, 3). This study was facilitated by preliminary observations (not shown) that heart membranes, in contrast to brain membranes, do not possess dopaminergic and serotonergic binding sites, which are also able to interact with 3H-DHE (4,5). This finding allowed us to perform a detailed study of the molecular properties of presynaptic and postsynaptic binding sites.Three important results were obtained in the present investigation. (i) Heart membranes contain an equal or higher amount of presynaptic than of postsynaptic a-adrenoceptors.(ii) Postsynaptic a-adrenoceptors show a high-affinity interaction with 3H-DHE according to the law of mass action. (iii) Interaction of 3H-DHE with presynaptic receptor sites exhibits the characteristics of a markedly positive homotropic cooperativity. This property provides an explanation, at the molecular level, for the mechanism regulating norepinephrine release from nerve endings.
MATERIAL AND METHODSExperiments were performed on a crude membrane preparation of rat heart, in order to avoid the possible loss of a-receptors which might result from more extensive purification. Homogenates were prepared by differential centrifugation between 400 and 28,000 X g according to the original method of Williams and Lefkowitz (6). The incubation buffer used for binding studies was 10 mM MgCl2/50 mM Tris-HCI, pH 7.5. 3H-DHE (New England Nuclear; specific activity, 24.1 Ci/ mmol) (0.5-0 nM) and myocardial membranes (400-600 mg) were incubated in glass tubes with and without a high concentration (50 MM) of the unlabeled a-blocker phentolamine, in a final volume of 300 ,l of incubation buffer. Incubations were stopped by diluting 200Wl aliquots with 4 ml of cold (40C) buffer followed by rapid filtration through Whatman GF/C glass fiber filters. Filters were rapidly washed with 15 ml of cold incubation buffer, dried, and assayed for radioactivity in 6 ml of Permafluor solution in a Packard Prias PL Tri-Carb liquid scintillation counter with an efficiency of 42%. Specific binding was taken as the difference between radioactivity measured on the filters in the absence and presence of phentolamine and represented 50-60% of the total binding of 3H-DHE.Addition to the incubation mixture of saturating concentrations of compounds, such as prazosin or ARC 239, which preferentially interact with postsynaptic receptors (A. M. Huchet, P. Mouille, R. Kadat...