Mass isolation and fertility testing of temperature-sensitive mutants in Tetrahymena.
A set of 239 heat-sensitive (38 degrees) and 16 cold-sensitive (18 degrees) conditional mutants of Tetrahymena has been generated by combining techniques to manipulate large numbers of clones with a method for the selection of self-fertilized cells after mutagen treatment. A simple technique is presented for determining the fertility of individual clones; 179 of the clones in this set (71%) are fertile. The fertile conditional mutants have already been shown to have lesions in a number of diverse functions, including nucleic acid metabolism, mobility, cell cycle, and cortical pattern.
D000818:Animals; D002467:Cell Nucleus / Q000502:physiology; D005298:Fertility; D008722:Methods; D009154:Mutation; D013696:Temperature; D013768:Tetrahymena / Q000235:genetics* / Q000302:isolation & purification / Q000502:physiology