ELECTRON MICROSCOPIC RADIOAUTOGRAPHY OF HELA CELLS INFECTED WITH ADENOVIRUS.

Harford, Carl G. (Washington University, St. Louis, Mo.), and Alice Hamlin. Electron microscopic radioautography of HeLa cells infected with adenovirus. J. Bacteriol. 89:1540-1547. 1965.-Because intracellular particles of adenovirus are not seen by light microscopy, radioautography with tritiated thymidine was carried out with an electron microscope. Reacted grains were present over many nuclei containing viral aggregates, but only 16% of these grains were over the aggregates. Control observations with tritium-labeled bacteria indicated that this low incidence of labeling of viral aggregates could not be attributed to errors of the method. We think that deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) labeled with tritiated thymidine in these experiments was mainly the excess viral DNA that is known to accumulate in adenovirus-infected cells. We did not exclude the possibility that some cellular DNA was labeled.