Inhibition of transforming activity of tyrosine kinase oncogenes by herbimycin A.

We studied the effectiveness of herbimycin A, an inhibitor of the function of the temperature-sensitive src oncogene, to reverse the morphologies of chicken and mammalian cells transformed by various oncogenes. It was found that the antibiotic was effective against the cells transformed by tyrosine kinase oncogenes src, yes, fps, ros, abl, erbB, but did not reverse the transformed morphologies induced by oncogenes raf, ras, and myc. Moreover, decreases in phosphotyrosine content of the total cellular proteins and in 36K protein phosphorylation by herbimycin treatment supported the selective inhibition of the antibiotic on the transforming activity of tyrosine kinase oncogenes.