Subcellular fractionation by differential and zonal centrifugation of aerobically-grown glucose-derepressed Saccharomyces carlsbergensis

A method is described for the preparation of spheroplasts in high yield from Schizosaccharomyces pombe, by treating cells grown in the presence of glucose and deoxyglucose with snail digestive enzymes. Gentle disruption of such sphero-plasts yielded homogenates, from which marker enzymes for nuclei (NAD pyrophosphorylase) and mitochondria (cytochrome c oxidase activity and spectro-scopically-detectable cytochromes a + a,) could be quantitatively sedimented by low-speed centrifugation. In contrast to previous findings with Saccharomyces carlsbergensis, cytochrome c oxidase and another mitochondrial enzyme, suc-cinate dehydrogenase, were completely sedimentable by zonal centrifugation in sucrose gradients in the presence of either 2 mM-MgC1, or 0.4 mM-EDTA. Mitochondria were apparently smaller and of lower buoyant density in gradients containing EDTA. The bulk of the total units of malate dehydrogenase and NADH: cytochrome c oxidoreductase sedimented with mitochondria, whereas NADPH: cytochrome c oxidoreductase was located in fractions containing no mitochondria. The distributions of mitochondrial enzymes were heterogeneous in populations of mitochondria separated on the basis of size or density. The possible origins of mitochondrial heterogeneity in extracts of S. pombe are discussed with special reference to changes in the enzyme activities of cells during the cell cycle