Developmental-stage-dependent adenine transport in Neurospora crassa

Abstract

Although germinated conidia of Neurospora crassa transport adenine through two different systems, only one of these, namely, the general purine transport system, which transports adenine, hypoxanthine, guanine, and 6-methylpurine, is present in freshly harvested conidia of the wild type. The second system develops during germination. The latter system can transport adenine and 6-methylpurine. Time course and kinetic studies of adenine transport in freshly harvested conidia of an ad-8 mutant indicated that, in contrast to the wild type, the general purine transport activity is very low in this strain and that the second adenine transport system is possibly present in the ungerminated conidia. A study of adenine and hypoxanthine uptake in ad-8 and ad-4 mutants, both of which cannot utilize hypoxanthine for growth, isolated that the two transport systems may be under different metabolic controls.