Proportion regulation without pattern formation in Dictyostelium discoideum.

When shaken in a glucose-albumin-cAMP medium, dissociated aggregative cells formed small clumps, in which both prespore and prestalk cells differentiated in essentially the same proportions as in a slug. Immunocytochemical staining of sections of such clumps revealed that the two types of cells showed no particular pattern of distribution, unlike the two-zoned prestalk-prespore pattern as observed in the slug. Cells dissociated at stages later than the onset of aggregation always produced a constant proportion of prespore cells, irrespective of the initial proportion when transferred to the culture. Furthermore, prestalk cells fractionated from slugs and transferred to the culture restored almost the normal prespore protortion through conversion of the cell types, whereas proportion of unfractionated slug cells remained unchanged. We conclude from these findings that the normal prestalk-prespore pattern is not required for proportion to be regulated.