Nitric oxide is synthesized in mammalian cells from L-arginine or from pharmaceutical drugs. It forms paramagnetic complexes with some metalloproteins, inhibiting key enzymes in DNA synthesis, mitochondrial respiration, iron metabolism, etc. This article reviews how electron paramagnetic resonance spectroscopy helps to detect unambiguously such specific molecular targets for NO in mammalian whole cells and organelles. EPR has also been used for the detection of spin adducts of free NO by spin-trapping methods.

Nitric oxide has been used for more than 20 years as an electron paramagnetic resonance probe of oxygen binding sites in oxygen-carriers and oxygen-metabolizing metalloenzymes. The high reactivity of NO with oxygen and the superoxide anion and its high affinity for metalloproteins led biochemists to consider NO as a highly toxic compound for a living cell. This assertion has recently been reconsidered following a number of discoveries of great significance: the finding of the activation of guanylate cyclase by NO, the recognition that NO is the precursor of nitrite and nitrate ions released in the activation of macrophages by endotoxin and cytokines, evidence that NO is an Endothelium-Derived Relaxing Factor, and the discovery of NO-biosynthesis from L-arginine, a pathway common in various biological cell-to-cell signalling processes. It is now admitted that NO plays a key bioregulatory role within mammalian cells, between cells of different types and in the host defence response. In the present review we have attempted to give a general picture of what is known of the chemical, physical, biochemical and biophysical properties of NO among the various nitrogen oxides. We have focussed on the structural information that can be obtained by electron paramagnetic resonance spectroscopy of nitrosyl-metalloprotein complexes. Finally we have shown how molecular targets of nitric oxide can be characterized, within whole cells, by electron paramagnetic resonance spectroscopy.

Nitric oxide (NO) binds to metalloproteins, and particularly to hemoproteins in both ferrous and ferric states, with association and dissociation rate constants which cover many orders of magnitude. These chemical properties often provide clear explanations of enzymatic specificity. A basic and straightforward description of the versatility of NO chemistry and of the biological relevance of NO effects, as understood by biochemists as opposed to physiologists, is presented. NO effects on hemoglobin and soluble guanylate cyclase, two proteins directly involved in arterio-venous oxygen transport at quite different biological levels, are compared. NO and other N-oxides also play primary roles in several mitochondrial functions. Specific interactions with cytochrome c oxidase and cytochrome c are reviewed, and the effects of NO and other N-oxides on other iron-cluster-containing components of mitochondrial respiration are discussed.