Regulation of the Hydrolysis of Adenine Nucleotides at the Surface of Cultured Vascular Cells

The working hypothesis for the experiments presented here is that the reaction sequence: ATP → ADP → AMP Adenosine occuring extracellularly, is a key regulatory sequence. Adenosine and its nucleotides occur extracellularly during many crisis or signalling events. They are agonists for a wide variety of physiologic responses. The antagonistic and competitive interactions among adenosine and its nucleotides, and the kinetic properties of the ectonucleotidases which carry out the sequential hydrolysis of the phosphate groups, provide for great subtlety in regulating the rate and extent of tissue response to the appearance of nucleotides in the pericellular space.