Genetic and immunological studies of bacteriophage T4 thymidylate synthetase

Thymidylate synthetase, which appears after infection of Escherichia coli with bacteriophage T4, has been partially purified. The phage enzyme is immunologically distinct from the host enzyme and has a molecular weight of 50,000 in comparison to 68,000 for the host enzyme. A system has been developed to characterize T4 td mutants previously known to have impaired expression of phage thymidylate synthetase. For this system, an E. coli host lacking thymidylate synthetase was isolated. Known genetic suppressors were transduced into this host. The resulting isogenic hosts were infected with phage T4 td mutants. The specific activities and amounts of cross-reacting material induced by several different types of phage mutants under conditions of suppression or non-suppression have been examined. The results show that the phage carries the structural gene specifying the thymidylate synthetase which appears after phage infection, and that the combination of plaque morphology, enzyme activity assays, and an assay for immunologically cross-reacting material provides a means for identifying true amber mutants of the phage gene.