Apolipoprotein A-I (apoA-I) incubated with CHO cells assembles three major nascent lipid complexes with diameters of 7.3, 9, and 11 nm. Previous studies suggested that the smaller nascent particles were precursors for the larger nascent ones. To test this hypothesis, the 7.3, 9, and 11 nm apoA-I-lipid complexes formed by incubating CHO cells with lipid-free apoA-I were isolated and subsequently each subpopulation was re-incubated with cells in the absence of other subpopulations. The physical-chemical characteristics of each subpopulation were examined before and after re-incubation in an effort to understand relationships. if any, between the different nascent complexes. The 7.3, 9, and 11 nm complexes were unique in that each of the particles had pre-alpha mobility on agarose gels: this rapid migration was not altered by re-incubation with cells. Protein crosslinking studies indicated that the 7.3, 9, and 11 nm complexes possessed 2, 3, and 4 apoA-I molecules per complex, respectively; it is unlikely that the size of the particle and number of apoA-I molecules per particle played a role in the increased negative charge of the particles. The present study shows that smaller particles did not give rise to larger ones upon re-incubation with cells. Rather, the 11 and 9 nm particles both generated smaller discs (the 11 nm giving rise primarily to 9 nm discs and the 9 nm complex giving rise to 7.3 nm discs) suggesting that, during incubation with cells, the complexes are destabilized and remodeled into smaller, not larger, complexes. Surprisingly, the 7.3 nm complexes during re-incubation with cells were extremely stable and did not undergo size alteration. When the 7.3 nm particles were incubated with additional small quantities of lipid-free apoA-I (1-2 microgram/ml), larger discoidal complexes were generated suggesting that the formation of larger particles may be driven by the availability of lipid-free apoA-I.