[Ultrastructural disorders of the mitotic apparatus during cytochalasin B action].

A correlation between the number of chromosome sets and the number of centrioles (8n--8 centrioles) was observed in polyploid metaphase cells, during cytochalasin B treatment on the cultured Chinese hamster cells. There is no correlation between the number of chromosome sets and the centriole number after stopping the action of the drug in many cells, but a great variation is observed in maintenance of chromosomes and centrioles (up 6 to 25 n and up 4 to 22 centrioles). In multipolar mitosis, either during the drug action or after its stopping, different numbers of chromosomes are directed towards the poles not depending on the number of centrioles in the poles. During the cytochalasin B treatment, either in bipolar or multipolar metaphases, there are destructions in the ultrastructure of the mitotic apparatus: there are no astral microtubules; in the poles there are diplosomes and duplex of centrioles with fibrillar material around both centrioles; kinetochores are of prometaphase type. After stopping the drug action the astral microtubules appear, but no other patterns of normalization in the mitotic apparatus occur. Desynchronization of three cycles (chromosomal, centriolar and centrosomal) is discussed as a factor of abnormal development of the mitotic apparatus and as a factor of stabilization of aneuploidy in the cell culture.