Temperature-dependent alterations in sugar transport in cells infected by a temperature-sensitive mutant of Rous sarcoma virus.

Cells transformed by Rous sarcoma virus take up 2-deoxyglucose at a faster rate than uninfected cells, under conditions where transformed and nontransformed cells grow at the same rate. In cells infected by a temperature-sensitive mutant, the stimulation of 2-deoxyglucose uptake is temperature dependent: the increase is observed at the permissive (36 degrees C), but not at the nonpermissive (41.5 degrees ) temperature. When infected cells are shifted from the nonpermissive temperature to the premissive temperature, the uptake of 2-deoxyglucose increases from a rate equal to that of uninfected cells to a rate equal to that of cells infected by the wild-type Schmidt-Ruppin Rous sarcoma virus. The reverse change occurs when the infected cells are shifted from the permissive to the nonpermissive temperature. By the use of cytosine arabinoside, an inhibitor of DNA synthesis, it was possible to show that DNA synthesis is neither required for the transformation, which occurs when the infected cells are shifted from the nonpermissive to the permissive temperature, nor for the phenotypic reversion, which occurs in the reverse shift.