A clone of cells in which the regulation of purine metabolism is genetically altered was selected and isolated from chemically mutagenized HTC cells (a line of rat hepatoma cells in continuous culture). The clone, designated MAU V, was selected for increased ability to salvage exogenous purines by isolating it in medium containing methylmercaptopurine ribonucleoside, adenine, and uridine, in which medium wild-type cells cannot divide. We have characterized these cells as having an increased rate of de novo purine biosynthesis, apparently as the result of an altered phosphoribosylpyrophosphate (PRPP) synthetase. The altered enzyme has normal catalytic properties but an altered sensitivity to feedback inhibition by purine and pyrimidine nucleotides. The types of inhibitions (competitive and uncompetitive) exerted by AMP, ADP, and TDP on the wild-type enzyme have been maintained in the altered enzyme, but values for Ki have been increased by factors of 10, 17.5, and 5, respectively. The specific catalytic activities of AMP: pyrophosphate phosphoribosyltransferase and IMP:pyrophosphate phosphoribosyltransferase are normal. The mutant cell may serve as a model for a specific human disease, one type of dominantly inherited overproduction hyperuricemia.Purine biosynthesis in mammalian cells is regulated at numerous sites along the pathway (1). The relative importance of each of these sites in maintenance of the physiologic state is unclear. Aberrant regulation can result in human disease, most notably overproduction hyperuricemia leading to gout (2). We have been examining the regulation of purine biosynthesis in a line of rat hepatoma cells in continuous culture (HTC cells) (3), which we consider to be a model for the mammalian hepatocyte. Because of recent advances in the techniques for studying the genetics of somatic mammalian cells (4-6), and because genetic approaches have been so profitably employed in studies of procaryotic regulatory mechanisms (7) Scintillation counting fluid consisted of 4 g of Omnifluor, 700 ml of toluene, and 250 ml of Triton X-100, except that the fluid used when counting Hyamine papers contained 300 ml of 95% ethanol instead of the Triton.HTC cells were grown as suspension cultures or as monolayers in Swim's 77 medium (3) containing 2 mM L-glutamine and 10% (vol/vol) calf serum (growth medium). Cells in monolayer culture were mutagenized for 2 hr with 30 AM N-methyl-N-nitroso-N'-nitroguanidine, conditions under which approximately 50% of the population survive, and were allowed to recover for 3 days before being selected for their ability to grow in the simultaneous presence of methylmercaptopurine ribonucleoside (MMPR) (0.2 mM), adenine (0.2 mM), and uridine (0.5 mM). Cells of the two surviving colonies from eight T-flasks were dispersed into single-cell suspensions in separate spinner flasks; an aliquot was then cloned in "cloning medium" (Swim's 77 medium containing 10% calf serum and 10% fetal-calf serum, supplemented with 2 mM glutamine and 1 mM pyruvate) that contained 0.3 ...