Effect of pleiotropic carbohydrate mutations (ctr) on tryptophan catabolism.

The pleiotropic ctr mutation has been shown to affect tryptophan uptake and tryptophanase formation. Genetic reversions are of two types: (i) complete, restoring to wild type, located at 46 to 47 min; (ii) partial, restoring only tryptophanase synthesis, located at 73 min. In some strains the effect of ctr mutations could be reversed by cyclic adenosine 3',5'-monophosphate (cAMP) plus tryptophan. A mutant producing tryptophanase constitutively was suppressed by a ctr mutation. Production of tryptophanase in this suppressed strain was not restored by the addition of cAMP, but required cAMP plus tryptophan.