It has been reported that diverse treatments which depolarize the plasma membrane of Neurospora crassa produce rapid increases in cyclic adenosine 3',5'-monophosphate (cyclic AMP) levels. In the current study, membrane active antibiotics, which are known or putative depolarizing agents, were found to produce similar cyclic AMP increases, not only in N. crassa, but also in the distantly related ...

A devescovinid flagellate from termites exhibits rapid gliding movements only when in close contact with other cells or with a substrate. Locomotion is powered not by the cell's own flagella nor by its remarkable rotary axostyle, but by the flagella of thousands of rod bacteria which live on its surface. That the ectosymbiotic bacteria actually propel the protozoan was shown by the following: (...

Translation constitutes an important and reliable means, though not the only means, for the identification and assay of mRNAs. The value of well-characterized systems capable of translating a variety of heterologous mRNAs has become increasingly apparent over the last 3-4 years. Currently systems of several sorts are available, ranging from highly fractionated cell-free extracts to the unrefine...

The kinetoplastid protozoa infect hosts ranging from invertebrates to plants and mammals, causing diseases of medical and economic importance. They are the earliest-branching organisms in eucaryotic evolution to have either mitochondria or peroxisome-like microbodies. Investigation of their protein trafficking enables us to identify characteristics that have been conserved throughout eucaryotic...

Isolated chicken erythrocyte nuclei have been incubated with dilute concentrations of the bifunctional cross-linking agent glutaraldehyde (0-20 mM) in order to stabilize histone-histone interactions within the native nucleus. The kinetics of the disappearance of acid-soluble histones, free amino groups, and of individual histones have been observed to be pseudo first-order. Apparent first-order...

Viruses which formed plaques on lawns of a eucaryotic, chlorella-like green alga were detected in 37% of the 35 freshwater samples surveyed. Virus populations, monitored in seven locations, fluctuated both qualitatively and quantitatively over an 8-month period.

The gene encoding an 18,000-dalton eucaryotic cell-binding protein of Chlamydia trachomatis serovar L2 was cloned into Escherichia coli, and the nucleotide sequence of a 1,658-base-pair PstI restriction endonuclease fragment encoding this protein was determined. The recombinant chlamydial gene consists of a 486-base-pair open reading frame encoding a polypeptide of molecular weight 18,314. The ...