MANIFESTATIONS OF INJURY IN YEAST CELLS EXPOSED TO SUBZERO TEMPERATURES I.

Abstract

Mazur, Peter (Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge, Tenn.). Manifestations of injury in yeast cells exposed to subzero temperatures. I. Morphological changes in freeze-substituted and in “frozen-thawed” cells. J. Bacteriol. 82:662–672. 1961.—When cells of the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae are cooled rapidly to −30 C or below, fewer than 0.01% survive. In contrast, when they are cooled slowly, up to 50% survive. The effect of cooling rate on survival was reflected in the morphological appearance of cells both before and after thawing. Appearance before thawing was observed by fixing the cells at subzero temperatures by freeze-substitution with cold ethanol. Slowly cooled freeze-substituted cells were considerably smaller and more flattened than those cooled rapidly. The differences in appearance and the differences in survival are both consistent with the view that intracellular ice formation occurs more extensively in rapidly cooled cells and is responsible for their higher mortality.

In spite of the high mortality (more than 99.99% killed), rapidly cooled cells remained as intact morphological entities when they were allowed to warm and thaw instead of undergoing freeze-substitution. However, they did differ from normal living yeast in two major respects: Their volume was halved and they lacked the large vacuole found in almost all the untreated living cells. The possession of a vacuole was closely correlated with survival. Suspensions warmed after slow cooling to −30 C contained cells of normal appearance and also nonvacuolate smaller ones. The admixture of morphological types was consistent with the fact that slow cooling yielded a higher percentage of viable cells than did rapid cooling.