Enzymatic and electron microscopic analysis of isolated osteoclasts

A new method is described by which osteoclasts can be isolated for biochemical and electron microscopic analyses. As a source of cells for isolation by microdissection, imprints of metaphyseal bone were used. The use of imprints provides important advantages over bone sections, including a higher degree of cytologic and enzymatic preservation, and the delivery of whole cells which are more readily manipulated and which yield data that are more readily reproduced. By planimetric analysis of the histochemically-stained isolated cell samples, it was shown that osteoclasts represent over 90% of the sample mass. The levels of several of the pyridine nucleotide-linked enzymes involved in citric acid metabolism, as well as acid phosphatase, were determined in osteoclast samples weighing 0.2 to 2.0 g isolated from normal and parathyroid-treated rats. Aconitase activity measured in the direction of citrate to isocitrate was 0.5–0.8 M/K_d/H, the lowest of the activities studied. The activities of GDH and NADP-ICDH were 5 to 10 times higher than that of aconitase but only a tenth to a third that of acid phosphatase, lactic or malic dehydrogenase.Supported by USPHS Grant No. AM 12491.