Time-course and specificity of the arginine requirement for adenovirus biosynthesis

Summary

Replicating adenovirus specifically requires arginine from the medium. A higher rate of tracer arginine utilization was measured in adenovirus infected cells during active synthesis of new virions. This implies that arginine is utilized for the synthesis of virus protein. The requirement cannot be solely explained on the basis of amino acid composition of virus protein, since the latter contains also leucine. Leucine had been shown to be also depleted by contaminating PPLO in the medium overlaying infected cells without interfering with virus biosynthesis. A mechanism is hypothesized, by which replicating adenovirus prevents the release of endogenous arginine, but not that of other amino acids.