To determine whether a single mutational event in one p53 gene is sufficient to confer a significant growth advantage on a colonic epithelial cell, the 143 (Ala) p53 mutation was previously expressed in the human colonic adenoma derived cell line AA/C1 (which is wild type for p53) and shown to have no effect on it's in vitro or in vivo growth characteristics. In this investigation, by expressing the 175 (His), 248 (Trp) or 273 (His) mutations in the same AA/C1 cell line, we have shown that this failure to affect the growth of the cells was not mutant specific. We have also demonstrated, using induction of MDM2 protein and the ability of the cells to undergo a p53 dependent G1 arrest, that the 143 (Ala), 175 (His) or 248 (Trp) transfected cells retain functional endogenous wild type p53 activity, and suggest that these p53 mutations would not have a fully dominant negative mode of action in vivo. In contrast, one of the two AA/C1 cell lines transfected with the 273 (His) mutation did fail to cell cycle arrest after gamma irradiation, indicating that this mutation can act as a dominant negative. However even loss of wild type p53 function in this cell line was insufficient to directly effect the growth rate of the AA/C1 cells, suggesting that acquisition of the 273 (His) mutation may contribute to malignant progression through genomic instability (by inhibiting the G1 arrest) and that other mutations are required before outgrowth of the cell population containing the p53 mutation.