Aspects of nucleic acid metabolism during development of the brine shrimp Artemia salina.

N ucleic a c id m etabolism of th e b r in e shrim p, Artem ia s a l i n a , has been th e s u b je c t o f r e c e n t in v e s t ig a t io n a t th e Oak Ridge N a tio n a l L a b o ra to r ie s (U .S .A .) t o determ ine th e source o f n u c le ic a c id p u rin e s r e l a t i v e t o th e c e l l u l a r n u c le o tid e p oo ls d u rin g developm ent. As a seq u e l t o t h i s work, and t o f u r th e r in v e s t ig a te th e b io ch em ica l e v en ts fo llo w in g h a tch in g o f A rtem ia, newly hatched la rv a e ( n a u p l i i ) a re 3 2 3 m ain ta ined f o r 6 hour p e rio d s in P i and adenosine~H and th e n u c le ic a c id s analyzed f o r ra d io a c tiv e in c o rp o ra tio n . From t h i s s tu d y i t i s a p p aren t t h a t v i r t u a l l y a l l RNA sy n th e s is i s te rm in a te d by 36 hours o f developm ent, w hereas DNA s y n th e s is c o n tin u e s f o r 18-20 a d d i t io n a l h o u rs . The r e la t io n s h ip between RNA and DNA m etabolism , n u c le ic a c id p u rin e c o n te n t , and th e p resence o f an u n u su a lly la rg e amount o f a h ig h m olecu lar-w eigh t RNA sp e c ie s in Artem ia i s d is c u s se d . R eproduced with perm ission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without perm ission.