Pharmacological control of osteoclastic motility

We separated osteoclasts from bone and observed the effect of several known and potential mediators of the control of bone resorption on their cytoplasmic motility. We already found that calcitonin (CT), a hormone that inhibits bone resorption, regularly causes complete inhibition of cytoplasmic motility, specific for osteoclasts, through a trypsin-sensitive membrane receptor [1]. We report here that prostaglandin I2 (PGI2) and dibutyryl cyclic AMP induce an identical change in osteoclastic behavior. We found that theophylline, which inhibits intracellular cyclic AMP degradation, and which itself had no effect on osteoclastic motility, potentiated the cytoplasmic inhibition caused by CT, PGI2, and cyclic AMP. This suggests that PGI2 and CT cause cytoplasmic quiescence by increasing the intracellular level of cyclic AMP, a view compatible with the known ability of CT to increase cyclic AMP in bone [2]. Parathyroid hormone (PTH), PGE2, and 1,25 dihydroxycholecalciferol (1,25 (OH)2D3), hormones known to stimulate osteoclasts, did not stimulate the activity of either active or quiescent isolated osteoclasts. The undoubted ability of these hormones to stimulate osteoclastic activity in vivo may therefore be mediated through a primary hormonal interaction with another cell type.