Metabolic regulation of aminoacyl-tRNA synthetase biosynthesis in bakers' yeast.

The specific activities of 15 aminoacyl-tRNA synthetases in Saccharomyces cerevisiae were measured after growth under a variety of conditions that produced a range of cell-doubling times. The specific activity of each synthetase increased as cell-doubling time decreased. Control experiments eliminate the possibility that these results are due to preferential recovery of synthetases, or to the presence of activators in the faster growing cultures or inhibitors in the slower growing ones. These observations run counter to the expectation that synthetases in bacteria and yeast are negatively regulated by free amino acids, or, more likely, by aminoacyl-tRNA. In fact, as the growth medium was enriched, generation times decreased, and synthetase and aminoacyl-tRNA levels increased. It is suggested that cytoplasmic aminoacyl-tRNA synthetases may be more or less coordinately controlled such that their response to growth follows the pattern observed for ribosome production and RNA synthesis. This suggests the possibility of coordinated response of genes for components of the protein synthetic apparatus.