Dolichol-linked glycoprotein synthesis in G1 is necessary for DNA synthesis in synchronized primary cultures of cerebral glia.

Primary cultures of newborn rat cerebrum, which are composed of glial cells (principally astroglia), were used for examining the relationship between dolichol-linked glycoprotein synthesis and DNA synthesis in developing cerebral glia. The cells were synchronized by reducing the content of fetal calf serum in the culture medium from 10 to 0.1% (vol/vol) for 48 h between days 4 and 6 in culture. Reversal of the quiescent state by return of the cultures to 10% serum causes a marked increase in DNA synthesis 12-24 h later. A sharp increase in glycoprotein synthesis (incorporation of [3H]mannose) occurred in the first 12 h after serum repletion, preceding the increase in DNA synthesis. Tunicamycin, an inhibitor of the dolichol-linked pathway to glycoprotein synthesis at the first committed step in oligosaccharide formation, promptly and completely prevented the increase in glycoprotein synthesis and, in addition, the subsequent increase in DNA synthesis. The effects of tunicamycin on glycoprotein and DNA syntheses were reversible, and no comparable effect on total protein synthesis was observed. When tunicamycin was added only during a temporally circumscribed period in G1, i.e., from 3 to 9 h after serum repletion, the increase in DNA synthesis between 12 and 24 h after repletion was still markedly inhibited, i.e., to approximately 45% of the value in untreated cultures. The data thus show that there is a requirement for dolichol-linked glycoprotein synthesis for the subsequent occurrence of DNA synthesis and that this requirement is expressed late in the G1 phase of the cell cycle.