Accounting for the ATP‐consuming processes in rabbit reticulocytes

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Abstract
The report deals with a detailed balance of ATP production and consumption of the rabbit reticulocyte. The sum-total of ATP produced amounts to 135 mmol .cntdot. l-1 .cntdot. h-1. About 70% of the ATP consumption was accounted for by specific processes. The main contributing processes are globin synthesis with about 28%, the Na+, K+-ATPase with 23% and proteolysis with more than 15%, 30% of ATP consumption was not accounted for. Cycloheximide (20 .mu.M) leads to a dissociation between synthesis and degradation of proteins, which argues against any obligatory connection between these processes. More than 90% of the lysine liberated from mitochondria by proteolysis was reutilized for globin synthesis demonstrating the high nitrogen economy of reticulocytes. Each of the ATP-consuming processes studied appears to control ATP production in an independent manner without competition with each other.