STUDIES ON THE BIOSYNTHESIS OF COLLAGEN

Abstract

Fowl osteoblasts grown in bulk tissue cultures in the presence of C14-L-proline incorporated this amino acid into peptide linkage. A significant amount of the incorporated radioactivity was found in the hydroxyproline, glutamic acid, and aspartic acid fractions of the cultures. The rate of formation of protein-bound C14 -hydroxyproline from C14-L-proline was maximal in cultures grown for 15 hours and fell exponentially with the increasing age of the cultures. C14 L-glutamic acid was incorporated by the osteoblast cultures, but no significant amount was converted to hydroxyproline.