Folate responsiveness during growth and development of Dictyostelium: separate but related pathways control...

Folate-controlled gene expression and chemotaxis have been examined in Dictyostelium wild-type and mutant strains. We show that regulation of the discoidin genes is sensitive to folate in growing cells as well as in suspension development. The signal is transferred via the N10-methylfolate-sensitive folate receptor sites, which also appear to confer the chemotactic response. The strain HG5145 has previously been isolated as a mutant that does not display chemotactic movement towards folate. Nevertheless, these cells are fully functional in folate-mediated downregulation of discoidin I expression. The strain ga 93 has been isolated as an overproducer mutant of the cyclic nucleotide phosphodiesterase inhibitor. Simultaneously, these cells fail to downregulate discoidin I in response to folate but are fully functional in folate chemotaxis. Therefore we conclude that the pathways for chemotaxis and for gene regulation diverge downstream of a common receptor type.