Ribonucleic Acid Metabolism in the Plasma Cell Sequence

Abstract

EXAMINATION of the immune response of rats to Salmonella antigens has confirmed a large body of evidence that plasma cells (mature and immature) are the chief producers of antibody¹. Both in the primary and secondary responses, these specialized effector cells arise by multiplication and differentiation of primitive lymphoid blast cells, and do not seem to divide^2,3. As each cell usually forms only one antibody⁴, its ribosomes presumably are geared primarily to the production of a single protein. The ultimate source of the information for this synthesis is unknown, but presumably during production it must be encoded in ribonucleic acid (RNA). The present experiments were designed to approach this problem by examination of RNA metabolism in the different members of the plasma cell family in vitro. Tritiated uridine, a precursor of both deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) and RNA, was used, the differential uptake into each being evaluated by digestion of the cells with the appropriate nucleases.