Quantitative cytochemical studies of cytochrome oxidase activity in rat dorsal root ganglion cells

The cytochrome oxidase activity of rat dorsal root ganglion cells was cytochemically and quantitatively measured. The 100 microns thick tissue slices fixed for 10 min were incubated in a DAB medium for 0, 30, 60, and 90 min at 37 degrees C, and electron-dense deposit areas within the mitochondrial intermembrane-intracristal spaces were measured with a computer-controlled image analyzer. The activity was expressed as deposit accumulation rate filling the mitochondrial space, (1 unit corresponds to the deposit filling 100% of the mitochondrial space per hour). Three different activities of the enzyme in either large pale cells or small dark cells of sensory neurons could be distinguished, based on the quantitative analysis, as large cells with intense (0.83 units), intermediate (0.38), and weak activity (0.22), and small cells with the same degrees of activity (1.04, 0.35, and 0.11, respectively). The results indicate that accumulation rate measurements of reaction product may be useful to quantitatively present the cytochrome oxidase reactivity of mitochondria, and that the degree of enzyme activity may contribute to the identification of functional differences in sensory neurons.