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SR 31747 is a novel immunosuppressant agent that arrests cell proliferation in the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae, SR 31747-treated cells accumulate the same aberrant sterols as those found in a mutant impaired in delta 8- delta 7-sterol isomerase. Sterol isomerase activity is also inhibited by SR 31747 in in vitro assays. Overexpression of the sterol isomerase-encoding gene, ERG2, confers enhanced SR resistance. Cells growing anaerobically on ergosterol-containing medium are not sensitive to SR. Disruption of the sterol isomerase-encoding gene is lethal in cells growing in the absence of exogenous ergosterol, except in SR-resistant mutants lacking either the SUR4 or the FEN1 gene product. The results suggest that sterol isomerase is the target of SR 31747 and that both the SUR4 and FEN1 gene products are required to mediate the proliferation arrest induced by ergosterol depletion.

Biological effects of solutions of non-histone chromatin-associated proteins on cell differentiation in vitro Nuclear non-histone (NNH) proteins, both chromatin-associated and otherwise, have been prepared in defined conditions, either from nuclei or from washed chromatin. When these NNH proteins are homospecific, they produce inhibitory effects on morphological differentiation of embryonic Urodelan Amphibian cells cultivated in vitro. When they are heterospecific, on the contrary, they have no action on the differentiation of those cells. It is concluded that the effects of the non-histone proteins on cell differentiation depend upon the relationship between the animal species which is used to provide the proteins and that used to provide the reactive material.

Attention has previously been drawn to a specific effect of NHCP on embryonic Pleurodeles cell differentiation. With a modified NHCP labelling technique, autoradiography has revealed a cytoplasmic concentration of labelled NHCP and has not revealed any difference between homospecific and heterospecific NHCP penetration.