The kinetic parameters of trehalase in whole and disrupted mitochondrial preparations from two insects with...

The kinetic parameters of trehalase in honey bee and flesh fly mitochondria were compared. The studies were carried out with whole mitochondria and with mitochondria disrupted in various ways and to different degrees. Honey bee mitochondrial trehalase was significantly activated by Lubrol WX treatment (30.0-fold), by high pH treatment (20.8-fold), and by a treatment consisting of 10 passes through a French press (37.9-fold) but not by the other treatments tried (salt, proteases, Waring blender, and sonication), despite the fact that these treatments also disrupted the mitochondria significantly. The activation effect was on the Vmax. The Km value did not change. Simple breakage of either the outer or inner (or both) membranes was not sufficient to activate trehalase from honey bees, which showed that the activation was not an indirect result of a change in the case with which trehalose can pass through the membranes. Honey bee trehalase is the first trehalase from insects with asynchronous muscle which has been shown to be activatable by physical and chemical methods. Flesh fly mitochondrial trehalase behaved quite differently from the honey bee enzyme in that it could not be activated by any of the techniques tried, even when there were significant amounts of disruption.