THE BIOSYNTHESIS OF AMINO ACID ACCEPTOR RNA

Abstract

Preliminary observations have been made on the biosynthesis of amino acid acceptor RNA in the mouse Ehrlich ascites carcinoma. Measurements have been made of the incorporation of radioactivity from either14C-CH3-methionine or uridine-2-14C into the RNA of nuclear and cytoplasmic fractions which precipitate at pH 5.0 from 105,000 × g supernatants of broken nuclei preparations and of cell homogenates ("soluble" RNA or sRNA). With either labelled precursor higher specific activities were found in the nuclear than in the cytoplasmic sRNA fractions. Whereas actinomycin D and DNase inhibited the incorporation of radioactivity from uridine-2-14C into nuclear sRNA, these agents stimulated significantly the incorporation of radioactivity from14C-CH3-methionine. The glycine acceptor capacity of nuclear sRNA was found to be greater than that of cytoplasmic sRNA. The base ratios of the amino acid acceptor RNA fractions derived from nuclear sRNA and from cytoplasmic sRNA by chromatography on methylated albumin columns were very similar. The results are consistent with the hypothesis that the amino acid acceptor RNA is made on a DNA-template in the nucleus of the tumor cells, is subsequently released from the template, methylated, and then transferred to the cytoplasm.