Cholinesterase and active sodium transport in frog skin

Abstract

In each of a series of 16 experiments, unpigmented ventral skin was removed from a frog of the species Rana pipiens. The skin was divided into three parts; two of these were used for duplicate determinations of cholinesterase activity, the third for measurement of bioelectric activity as manifested by the short-circuit current, the two kinds of measurement being made during the same time period. The product moment correlation coefficient for these two variables was found to be +0.87. The best fitting straight line, calculated for these data by the method of least squares, is represented by the equation: I = –5.7 + 19.5 R, where I is the short-circuit current in microamperes per square centimeter and R is the cholinesterase activity in micromoles per square centimeter per hour.