Auxin autonomy in cultured tobacco teratoma tissues transformed by an auxin-mutant strain of Agrobacterium tumefaciens.

We have studied the mechanism of auxin autonomy in tobacco (Nicotiana tabacum L.) crowngall tissues transformed by the auxin-mutant (tms (-)) A66 strain of Agrobacterium tumefaciens. Normally, tms (-) tobacco tumor tissues require the formation of shoots to exhibit auxin-independent growth in culture. We have isolated from tms (-) tobacco cells several stable variants that are fully hormone-independent and grow rapidly as friable, unorganized tissues, thus mimicking the growth and morphology of tms (+) tobacco cells that produce high levels of auxin. However, none of the variants contained the high levels of auxin found in tms (+) tumor cells. The variants could be divided into two classes with respect to their response to applied auxin. The first class was highly sensitive to applied auxin: low concentrations (1 μM) of α-naphthaleneacetic acid (NAA) severely inhibited growth and markedly stimulated the accumulation of the ethylene precursor, 1-aminocyclopropane-1-carboxylic acid (ACC). The second class of variants showed a low sensitivity to applied auxin: growth was promoted by concentrations of NAA up to 10 μM, and growth inhibition and high ACC levels were observed only at high NAA concentrations (100 μM). Unorganized variants with low auxin sensitivity were also isolated from a variant line with high auxin sensitivity. The isolation of tumor cells that exhibited the growth phenotype of tms (+) cells while retaining the low auxin content and low auxin sensitivity of tms (-) cells indicates that full hormone autonomy, characteristic of wild-type crown-gall tumors, can be achieved by a mechanism that is independent of changes in the auxin physiology of the cells.