Determination of ribonucleoside triphosphate pools in influenza A virus-infected MDCK cells

A rapid method for determining the concentration of ribonucleoside triphosphates in cell cultures is described. The pool sizes of the ribonucleoside triphosphates in uninfected MDCK cells were found to be, 0.28-0.59 mM CTP, 0.96-1.6 mM UTP, 6.5-7.8 mM ATP, and 1.1-1.4 mM GTP, depending on the condition of the cell-monolayer. Infection of MDCK cells with influenza A strains Victoria 3/75 x-47 or WSN resulted in insignificant changes in the ribonucleoside triphosphate concentrations. Treatment of infected and non-infected MDCK cells with ribavirin caused a decrease of 60 per cent in the GTP pool.