Establishment and characterization of a carrier cell culture producing high titres of polyoma JC virus.

This report concerns a carrier cell culture (designated JCI) infected persistently with JC virus (JCV). Immunostaining with an anti-JCV antiserum revealed that JCI was a carrier culture in which only a small fraction of the cells (approximately 1.5%) produced the virus. The JCV titre was increased strikingly by incubating confluent JCI cells for 4-6 days in medium containing a low concentration of fetal bovine serum (2%). Viral genomes cloned from the persistently infected JCI cells were heterogeneous with respect to size, but most clones had an alteration of the same regulatory region (designated CR-JCI). Transfection experiments with a chimeric JCV DNA (Mad-1/CR-JCI), in which the regulatory region was CR-JCI and the other region was derived from an infectious JCV (Mad-1) DNA, showed that CR-JCI was less efficient in inducing viral growth than the regulatory regions of IMR-32-adapted JCVs. The transfected cells could be readily subcultured, and they continued to produce JCV. It is concluded that a decrease in the activity of the JCV regulatory region is of importance for the maintenance of the carrier state of JCI cells.

Alterations in activation and deactivation of mutagens in aging rat liver.

Age-associated alternations in activation and deactivation of benzo[a]pyrene (BP), furylfuramide (AF2), and 2-nitrofluorene (NF) in rat liver were investigated. A modified Ames mutagenicity test system used liver 9000 g supernatant (S-9) from male Fischer 344 rats aged 3, 6, 12, and 24 months fortified with NADPH generating system alone or together with cofactors of conjugating enzymes. The numbers of revertant colonies due to mutagenic activation of BP during preincubation were markedly high in young rats and decreased with aging. They were decreased by the addition of UDP-glucuronic acid (15 mM) or glutathione (30 mM), the cofactors of UDP-glucuronyl transferase and glutathione S-transferase, respectively, in the preincubation mixture. The difference in the BP activation by liver S-9 from different age groups almost disappeared by the addition of reduced glutathione. A direct mutagen, AF2, was not metabolized during preincubation in the absence of cofactors of conjugating enzymes, but detoxified up to about 50% by the addition of glutathione to the preincubation mixture containing liver S-9 from rats of any age group. Another direct mutagen, NF, was partly detoxified during preincubation by liver S-9 from 3-month-old rats more than by that from 24-month-old rats. It is suggested that incidence of chemical carcinogenesis may increase along with aging due to the altered xenobiotics metabolism.

Evidence of partial involvement of P-450 2D in mutagenic activation of benzo(a)pyrene in liver S-9 fraction from untreated rats.

In order to clarify which species of cytochrome P-450 is involved in activation of benzo(a)pyrene (BP) in untreated rat liver, strain and sex differences in the ability of rat liver 9000 g supernatant (S-9) to mutagenically activate BP was investigated using Ames test. The numbers of histidine revertants in Ames test after pre-incubation of TA 98 strain of Salmonella typhimurium and BP with liver S-9 from male rats were markedly higher than those obtained using female rats. In addition, a marked strain difference (Wistar > DA) in the ability of liver S-9 from Wistar and DA rats to activate BP was observed. Antibody against cytochrome P-450 2D inhibited up to 50% of the revertant formation by the activation of BP with liver S-9 from male Wistar rats. These results indicate the partial involvement of cytochrome P-450 2D subfamily as well as cytochrome P-450 species specific to male rats in activation of BP to ultimate mutagen in untreated rat liver.