The reactions of amino acids with soluble ribonucleic acid from guinea-pig mammary cells

Abstract

Systems were developed for the study of the reactions of the enzyme systems and cell-sap ribonucleic acid (RNA) of guinea-pig mammary tissues with C14 amino acids and adenosine triphosphate. The quantities of amino acids taken up by such systems depend on the amino acid concentration and on the cell-sap RNA concentration. Though there are specific sites for each amino acid studied, the precise number of sites is difficult to evaluate because of non-specific reactions. From the data obtained the conclusion can be drawn that the extent of combination of amino acids with cell-sap determines the RNA quantities of each amino acid to be incorporated into protein. This step may also be responsible for conferring additional specificity on amino acids to determine their addition to polypeptide chains in the correct position in the sequence.