Dynamics of the thymidine triphosphate pool during the cell cycle of synchronized 3T3 mouse fibroblasts.

To investigate whether resting cells of 3T3 mouse fibroblasts carry out de novo synthesis of deoxyribonucleoside triphosphates, we determined the turnover of the thymidine triphosphate pool of G0 cells obtained by starvation of cultures for platelet-derived growth factor. These cells were contaminated by less than 1% S-phase cells. In the absence of deoxyribonucleosides in the medium one million G0 cells contained 5 pmole of dTTP with a turnover of 0.09 pmole/min. S-phase cells in comparison contained a 20 times larger dTTP pool with a more than 200-fold faster turnover. Our results suggest that G0 cells carry out a slow but finite de novo synthesis of deoxyribonucleoside triphosphates to satisfy the cells' requirement for DNA repair and mitochondrial DNA synthesis.