Salvage syntheses and their relationship to nucleic acid metabolism

The intraerythrocytic stages of plasmodia are capable of synthesizing purine nucleotides and apparently deoxycytidylate by salvage syntheses. Data obtained by studying the incorporation of radioactive precursor molecules into intact cells and kinetic experiments on purified enzyme preparations suggest biosynthetic routes which, generally, are similar to those of the host's cell metabolism. However, details on the regulation of both the uptake of nucleosides and bases into the intraerythrocytic stages of plasmodia and of the metabolic routes involved in this incorporation are still lacking.