VARIATIONS IN LEUCINE TRANSFER RIBONUCLEIC ACID IN MOUSE PLASMA CELL TUMORS PRODUCING K-TYPE IMMUNOGLOBIN LIGHT CHAINS

A comparison was made of the chromatographic profiles of leucyl transfer ribonucleic acid from normal mouse liver and from several murine plasma cell tumors all of which secrete a unique example of the same antigenic class (k) of immunoglobulin light chain. Using the Freon-Aliquat 336 reversed-phase column at least five leucyl transfer ribonucleic acid peaks are seen in profiles from liver and several tumors, with stable, reproducible differences among them in the relative proportion of each isoaccepting species. Certain other tumors producing the same class of light-chain protein appear to be very deficient in peaks 3 and/or 5 suggesting that these tumors do not have significant amounts of these components normally found in mammalian transfer ribonucleic acid. It is suggested that these quantitative and qualitative variations in leucyl transfer ribonucleic acid within a very closely related group of similarly differentiated tissues indicate that the different leucyl transfer ribonucleic acid genes are under independent control. © 1969, American Chemical Society. All rights reserved.