Acidosis modulates physiologic and pathophysiologic processes but the mechanism of acidotic vasodilatation remains unclear. We therefore explored this in aortic rings from normal and streptozotocin-induced diabetic Sprague-Dawley rats. Phenylephrine (PE)-induced contraction in endothelium-intact and -denuded rings were recorded under normal and acidotic pH with or without drug probes. Acidosis exerted a relaxant effect in endothelium-intact and -denuded euglycaemic and diabetic tissues. l-NAME or methylene blue partially inhibited acidotic relaxation in these endothelium-intact but not the -denuded tissues, with greater inhibition in the diabetic tissues, indicating that acidosis induces relaxation by endothelium-dependent and -independent mechanisms, the former being EDNO-cGMP mediated. Indomethacin had no effect on the tissues, indicating that cyclooxygenase products are neither involved in acidosis-induced vasodilatation nor in the modulation of phenylephrine-contraction. In euglycaemic tissues under normal pH, no K(+) channel blocker altered phenylephrine-contraction, but all (except glibenclamide) enhanced diabetic tissue contraction, indicating that normally, these channels (K(ir), K(V), BK(Ca), K(ATP)) do not modulate phenylephrine-contraction, but they (except K(ATP)) are expressed in diabetes where they attenuate phenylephine-induced contraction and modulate acidosis. Only the K(ir) channel modulates acidotic relaxation in euglycaemic tissues. Only tetraethylammonium and iberiotoxin enhanced phenylephrine-induced contraction in endothelium-denuded diabetic tissues indicating that BK(Ca) attenuates phenylephrine-contraction and that acidotic relaxation in this condition is modulated by a tetraethylammonium-sensitive mechanism. In conclusion, acidosis causes vasodilatation in normal and diabetic tissues via endothelium-dependent and -independent mechanisms differentially modulated by a combination of a NO-cGMP process and K(+) channels, some of which are dormant in the normal state but activated in diabetes mellitus.