The effects of temperature and metabolic inhibitors on the spontaneous relaxation of the potassium contracture of the heart of the frog Rana pipiens.

1. The spontaneous relaxation of the potassium contracture and the relaxation induced by the removal of extracellular calcium or the restoration of the original potassium concentration, in the frog heart, show a strong dependence on temperature.2. The energy of activation of the later exponential phase of the spontaneous relaxation is 10.43 kcal mole(-1), a value close to that reported for the binding of calcium ions by isolated sarcoplasmic reticulum, but larger than that for the calcium efflux from mammalian heart.3. The use of metabolic inhibitors shows that relaxation can be sustained when glycolysis is poisoned, but the disruption of oxidative phosphorylation slows relaxation.4. Poisoning of both glycolysis and oxidative phosphorylation blocks all but the small initial part of the spontaneous relaxation of the potassium contracture and also interferes with relaxation induced by other means.5. The results are considered to favour the existence, in frog heart, of an active intracellular relaxing system which uses ATP as its substrate to lower the sarcoplasmic calcium concentration. This system is likely to be the sarcoplasmic reticulum but the mitochondria could also be involved.