Blood, 1958, Vol. 13, No. 4, pp. 367-375.
© 1958 American Society of Hematology, Inc.
The Efficiency of Oxidative Phosphorylation by Normal
and Leukemic Human Leukocytes
VIRGINIA E. DAVIS 1,
WILLIAM L. WILSON 1, and
CHARLES L. SPURR 1
1 Department of Medicine, Baylor University College of Medicine, and the
Veterans Administration Hospital, Houston, Texas.
1. A new modification of existing methods has been described for the separation of leukocytes from whole blood which provides a procedure for the
rapid isolation of uninjured cells suitable for the study of oxidative phosphorylations.
2. This method has been employed in a study of the relative efficiency
and yield of oxidative-linked phosphorylations mediated by normal and leukemic or immature leukocytes. The maximum aerobic phosphorylating capacity
was exhibited by chronic lymphocytic leukemic leukocytes, followed in decreasing order of activity by acute monocytic leukemic leukocytes and chronic
myelocytic leukemic leukocytes. Oxidative phosphorylation was not demonstrated with normal leukocytes.
3. Results of this study suggest that expression of leukocyte metabolic
data on a unit nitrogen basis more accurately reflect the morphologically obvious size differences among the various leukocytes than presentation of data
on a unit cell basis.
4. The aerobic phosphorylations mediated by leukemic leukocytes were
found to be dependent upon substrate addition and were depressed by low
levels of dinitrophenol. Under the experimental conditions employed in this
study, glucose-6-phosphate was formed in stoicheiometric amounts. These results indicate that leukemic leukocytes are capable of the aerobic esterification of inorganic phosphate accompanying the oxidation of selected Kreb's
cycle intermediates.
Submitted on August 2, 1957
Accepted on November 2, 1957
