Chemotactic response of Dictyostelium discoideum cell to c-AMP at the culmination stage.

A certain chemo-attractant which controls the cell movement is present in the culminating fruiting body as it is in the aggregation center. Cells at the culmination stage, too, are chemotactically sensitive to c-AMP. The motility of the fruiting body cells depends upon the changes in c-AMP concentration; moreover, it tends to be high in lower c-AMP concentrations as compared with that of the pseudoplasmodium cells. This suggests that the cell movement may be basically controlled by c-AMP in the culminating fruiting body as well as in the aggregating cell streams and the migrating pseudoplasmodium.