Multienzymic nature of pyruvate kinase during development of Hymenolepis diminuta (Cestoda)

H. diminuta at different stages of development contained as many as five pyruvate kinase isozymes. Four of these were unusually sensitive to allosteric activation by fructose-1,6-P2. One isozyme which occurred only in adults or near-adults was insensitive but had a relatively low Km. All were inhibited by ATP and Ca2+, none by alanine, and the pH optimum was unaffected by fructose-1,6-P2. The five isozymes were present in gravid or reproductively active proglottids. Two of them occurred after eight days growth in the rat intestine, and three after four days. These three were also present in the immature, anterior proglottids of adult parasites. Hexacanth larvae from gravid proglottids, as well as cysticercoids developing from these larvae in Tenebrio molitor, possessed only two isozymes. It was inferred from information on tissue concentrations of ADP, ATP, phosphoenolypyruvate (PEP) and on K0.5S and Km that competition between pyruvate kinase and PEP carboxykinase is probably controlled by fructose-1,6-P2 concentrations. Since H. diminuta is an obligatory fermenter in which gluconeogenesis is minimal, the probable function of its L-type pyruvate kinases is to control the specific composition of lactic, acetic and succinic acid mixtures that are excreted at different stages of development.