Retrograde axonal transport of specific macromolecules as a tool for characterizing nerve terminal membranes

The uptake of macromolecules by nerve terminals which is followed by retrograde axonal transport seems to occur by two different mechanisms, a specific and a nonspecific one. The nonspecific uptake depends on the presence of macromolecules (e.g., horseradish peroxidase) in the vicinity of the nerve terminals at very high concentrations and is enhanced by neuronal activity. In contrast, the specific uptake and subsequent retrograde axonal transport becomes apparent at much lower concentrations of the appropriate macromolecules, depends on the affinity of these ligands for specific binding sites on the surface of the neuronal membrane, and is independent of neuronal activity. The fact that lectins and some bacterial toxins bind to specific membrane glycoproteins or glycolipids allows conclusions to be drawn regarding qualitative and even quantitative aspects of the composition of the plasma membrane of the nerve terminals. 125I-labelled nerve growth factor (NGF), tetanus toxin, cholera toxin, wheat germ agglutinin (WGA), ricin II, phytohemagglutinin (PHA), and concanavalin A (ConA) were injected into the anterior eye chamber of rats where they were taken up by adrenergic nerve terminals and transported retrogradely to the superior cervical ganglion. The saturation of the uptake-transport found for NGF, WGA, choleragenoid and an atoxic binding-fragment of tetanus toxin indicates that limited numbers of binding sites, which showed also different affinities, are present for each ligand on the membrane of the nerve terminals. Competition experiments showed that the binding sites for the ligands investigated are largely independent. Two different classes of binding sites (high affinity--low capacity and intermediate affinity--intermediate capacity) seem to be involved in the saturable retrograde axonal transport of NGF. In contrast, WGA seems to have only a single class of binding-uptake sites with high capacity and relatively low affinity. Strong evidence for positive cooperativity was obtained for the uptake and subsequent transport of the tetanus toxin fragment.