Mutants of CHO cells resistant to the protein synthesis inhibitors, cryptopleurine and tylocrebrine: genetic and biochemical evidence for common site of action of emetine, cryptopleurine, tylocrebine, and tubulosine.

Stable mutants resistant to the protein synthesis inhibitors cryptopleurine and tylocrebine can be isolated in Chinese hamster ovary (CHO) cells, in a single step. The frequency of occurrence of cryptopleurine (CryR) and tylocrebrine (TylR) resistant mutants in normal and mutagenized cell populations is similar to that observed for emetine resistant (EmtR) mutants. The CryR, TylR, and EmtR mutants exhibit strikingly similar cross-resistance to the three drugs used for selection, to tubulosine and also to two emetine derivatives cephaeline and dehydroemetine, based on assays of in vivo cytotoxicity and on assays of protein synthesis in cell-free extracts. The identity of cross-resistance patterns of the CryR, TylR, and EmtR mutants indicates that the resistance to all these compounds results from the same primary lesion, which in the case of EmtR cells has been shown to affect the 40S ribosomal subunit. This conclusion is strongly supported by the failure of EmtR, TylR, and CryR mutants to complement each other in somatic cell hybrids. Based on these results it is suggested that the above group of compounds possesses common structural determinants which are responsible for their activity. The above mutants, however, do not show any cross-resistance to other inhibitors of protein synthesis such as cycloheximide, trichodermin, anisomycin, pactamycin, and sparsomycin, either in vivo or in vitro, indicating that the site of action of these inhibitors is different from that of the emetine-like compounds.