The Role of the Na+/H+ Antiport in Cardiac Cells, Skeletal Muscle Cells, Neuronal Cells, and Glial Cells

During the last decade, a great deal of attention has been devoted to the regulation of the intracellular pH of eukaryotic cells. To a large extent, this development has been made possible by the development of new technologies to measure and monitor variations in the intracellular pH of living cells and of ionophores that can be used to clamp pH_i at defined values. Another important advance was the realization that membrane ion exchange systems that catalyze the translocation of H⁺ across the plasma membrane play a major role in regulating pH_i. One of these systems is the Na⁺/H⁺ antiport.