Dependence of cellular metabolism and local oxygen delivery on oxygen tension.

Abstract

It is recognized that the survival of nearly all mammalian cells is dependent on the availability of an adequate supply of oxygen. An elaborate and highly regulated vascular system is responsible for maintaining the proper oxygen tension at each region of the body, with some areas (such as the kidney) being higher than others (such as the liver). Thus the vascular system must not only deliver O2 at the rate it is being consumed by the tissue but also maintain the characteristic local oxygen tension. Studies on the oxygen dependence of pulmonary flow have indicated that the control sites are predominantly precapillary, residing particularly in the arterial and arteriolar vessel walls (Marshall and Marshall, 1983). The situation in skeletal muscle is more complex. Gorczynski and Duling (1978) observed the effect of electrical stimulation of small isolated groups of striated muscle cells in hamster cremaster muscle on arteriolar diameter and reported that arteriolar dilation preceded the decrease in local oxygen tension. The steady state amount of dilation, however, correlated with the steady state decrease in local oxygen tension.KeywordsOxygen TensionCoronary FlowCoronary Blood FlowOxygen SensorMitochondrial Oxidative PhosphorylationThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.