Chemically characterized media for study of foot-and-mouth disease virus in baby hamster kidney cells.

Foot-and-mouth disease virus can be grown in baby hamster kidney cells with a chemically characterized medium containing only tris(hydroxymethyl)-amino-methane (Tris) buffer, glucose, glutamine, and salts. Virus infectivity was only 0.5 log unit less than in a complex cell growth medium containing serum, tryptose phosphate, and lactalbumin hydrolysate. At high multiplicity of infection, production was maximal in 5 hr, with the virus remaining largely intracellular. Glucose and glutamine appeared to act independently of each other although both were required at about the same time during the virus production cycle. Glutamine had the greater effect and could not be replaced by amino acids, purines, and pyrimidines. Glutamine also stimulated cellular oxygen uptake in both normal and infected cells. Serum and other organic components added singly to the defined medium did not increase the virus yield. Studies on uninfected cells over a 5-hr incubation period showed that the defined medium maintained protein and ribonucleic acid synthesis at rates similar to the complex cell growth medium. These rates were much lower in media containing only inorganic salts and Tris buffer. Glucose, however, was more important to uninfected cellular metabolism than was glutamine. Defined medium containing dialyzed calf serum produced the highest rate of protein synthesis.