Effect of TEA on light emission from aequorin-injected aplysia central neurons

Aplysia central neurons were injected with the calcium-sensitive photoprotein aequorin and stimulated with trains of identical depolarizing voltage-clamp pulses. The light emissions grew and the outward currents declined in successive pulses. Tetraethylammonium (TEA) enhanced the light emissions to single depolarizing pulses and suppressed the outward current. The remaining net inward current is carried primarily by calcium ions and does not facilitate. The aequorin emissions were larger at all amplitudes of depolarizing pulses that elicited emissions, and the facilitation of emissions in a train of pulses was reduced. The effect of TEA on outward current was nearly maximal when sodium ions were partially replaced with 0.1 M TEA, while the aequorin emissions were further enhanced by increasing the TEA concentration to 0.459 M. TEA enhanced the aequorin emissions at all voltages. These observations suggest that the action of TEA on aequorin emissions is not strictly a consequence of its better known outward current blocking action. The effects of TEA could be partly due to the lowered sodium concentration of these solutions. Replacement of sodium by Tris, sucrose or mannose, however, all produced no enhancement of emissions. Tetramethylammonium (TMA) replacement of sodium had effects similar to those of TEA. Thus TEA and TMA appear to have a specific effect. Part of the enhancement of light emissions by TEA is due to the removal of a series resistance error in the voltage clamp, and this may also account partly for the reduced facilitation of aequorin emissions in TEA. The remainder of the action of TEA on aequorin emissions evidently reflects a specific but previously unrecognized action on the cellular metabolism of calcium ions or on the voltage-dependent calcium channels.