Aberrant transmembrane signal transduction in Dictyostelium cells expressing a mutated ras gene.

Dictyostelium discoideum cells contain a single ras gene (Dd-ras) that is highly homologous to mammalian ras genes. Cell transformation with a vector carrying a ras gene with a (glycine----threonine) missense mutation at position 12 causes an altered morphogenesis. Extracellular cAMP signals regulate morphogenesis and induce chemotaxis and the activation and subsequent desensitization of adenylate and guanylate cyclase. cAMP signal transduction was investigated in Dd-ras-transformed cells. Transformants that overexpress the mutated Dd-ras-Thr12 gene show normal activation and desensitization of adenylate cyclase and normal activation of guanylate cyclase. However, cAMP induces a stronger desensitization of guanylate cyclase stimulation in the Dd-ras-Thr12 transformant than in transformants overexpressing the Dd-ras-Gly12 wild-type gene or in untransformed cells. This effect was correlated with a reduced chemotactic sensitivity of the transformant expressing the mutated Dd-ras-Thr12 gene.