Adenosine 3′,5′-cyclic monophosphate dependent and independent protein kinase activities in 1,2-dimethylhydrazine induced rat colon cancer☆

Abstract The adenosine 3′,5′-cyclic monophosphate (cAMP)-dependent and cAMP-independent kinase activities were measured in the 1,2-dimethylhydrazine (DMH) induced rat colon cancer and in untreated colon. Previous studies had shown that intestinal tumors induced by chronic exposure to DMH contained 2-fold less intracellular cAMP. The present findings indicate that reduction in cAMP-dependent protein kinase activities also occur in colon cancer cells. Similar hydrogen ion dependence (pH 6–7) and approximate association constants ( K a ∼ 0.1 μM) were observed for the enzymes existing in both normal and tumor tissues, while the cAMP-dependent tumor protein kinase was found to phosphorylate phosvitin and casein to a greater degree. These recent findings are consistent with the concept that the concentrations of cAMP and activities of its associated enzyme system are inversely related to the cell proliferation state.