Complex III staining in blue native polyacrylamide gels

For more than a decade now blue native polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (BN-PAGE) has been used for the study of the oxidative phosphorylation (OXPHOS) complexes. Catalytic activities of complexes I, II, IV and V can be assessed, after separation by gel electrophoresis, by incubation of the BN-PAGE gel in specific staining solutions. However, until now, a reliable staining method for testing ubiquinol cytochrome c oxidoreductase (complex III) activity by BN-PAGE gel techniques was not available. In addition, spectrophotometric methods currently in use for detection of complex III deficiency in patients are not very sensitive. Here, we describe a newly developed diagnostic method for visualization of complex III activity by direct in-gel evaluation of ubiquinol cytochrome oxidoreductase activity. We validated the method by reporting the results in six patients with previously characterised complex III defects.