Effects of arginine deprivation upon chromosome aberrations, sces and survival of cho cells treated with mutagenic agents.

Arginine deprivation sensitizes CHO cells to the clastogenic activity of the mutagenic agents UV light, N-methyl-N'-nitro-N-nitrosoguanidine, mitomycin C and 4-nitroquinoline-1-oxide. Cells were allowed to undergo proliferative arrest by deprivation of the amino acid arginine, treated with mutagenic agent and refed with complete medium. The resulting mitotic cells displayed more chromosome aberrations than did mitotic cells in proliferating cell cultures which had been treated similarly. This effect was observed at each dose tested (representing a 300-fold range in concentration). Survival of arginine-deprived cells exposed to UV light was also markedly reduced in comparison to the response of proliferating cells. Sister-chromatid exchange levels induced by MNNG, in contrast, were similar in arginine-deprived and proliferating cells.