Excised maize (Zea mays) root tips were used to follow the effects of a prolonged glucose starvation. Respiration rate began to decrease immediately after excision, reaching 30 to 40% of its initial value after 20 hours, and then declined more slowly until death of the tissues, which occurred after 200 hours of starvation. During the whole process, respiration could be uncoupled by 2,4-dinitrophenol and the energy charge remained high. These results suggest that in excised maize root tips, respiration rate is essentially limited by the rate of biosyntheses (ATP-utilizing processes) rather than mitochondrial number. Carbohydrates are the main respiratory substrates for plants, furnishing the malate and the acetyl-CoA necessary for the functioning of the Krebs cycle. Fifteen years ago it was still considered that, during the day, photosynthesis allowed starch synthesis in such amounts that the plant, particularly the root system, was never deprived of sugars. However, it is now known that carbohydrate starvation is common in most higher plants. Indeed, microbial, insect, or herbivore attacks or reduction in light intensity or temperature may cause a substantial decrease in photosynthesis, and thus lead to starvation.Since the end of the seventies, carbohydrate starvation has been studied in a number of plant species: wheat (28, 29), maize (14, 18), barley (8), pearl millet (1), pea (20,26,27), soybean (13, 25), sycamore (7, 10, 12, 17), etc. These studies have shown that in most cases, sugar starvation triggers the following sequence in plant cells: (a) the depletion of intracellular carbohydrate content and the subsequent decrease of respiration (1,12,18,20,25); (b) the breakdown of lipids and proteins (1,7,12,28) and a decline in the respiratory quotient from 1 to 0.75 (18); (c) an increase in inorganic phosphate ( 12,17), phosphorylcholine (7, 17), and free amino acids (10), and a concomitant decline in nucleotides (17, 18) and glycolytic enzymatic activities (12); and (d) the more or less marked disappearance of some cell ultrastructures (1, 29).The origin of the respiratory decrease during starvation was first attributed to carbohydrate depletion, by way of limitation of the substrate either for respiration or for biosynthetic processes; however, some experiments showed that root respiration rate was not a simple function ofcarbohydrate supply (8). Journet and co-workers (12) reported that during starvation the decrease in uncoupled respiration of sycamore cells was attributable to a progressive decrease in the number of mitochondria per cell; these authors concluded that the availability of respiratory substrates for the mitochondria does not determine the respiration rate of starved cells.In the present work, we investigated changes in 02 consumption, different organic compounds (sugars, fatty acids, proteins, adenine nucleotides), enzyme activities, and physical parameters (fresh and dry weight, osmolarity) in excised maize (Zea mays) root tips from the beginning of glucose starvation to tissue dea...

Excised maize (Zea mays L.) root tips were used to monitor the effects of prolonged glucose starvation on nitrogen metabolism. Following root-tip excision, sugar content was rapidly exhausted, and protein content declined to 40 and 8% of its initial value after 96 and 192 h, respectively. During starvation the contents of free amino acids changed. Amino acids that belonged to the same "synthetic family" showed a similar pattern of changes, indicating that their content, during starvation, is controlled mainly at the level of their common biosynthetic steps. Asparagine, which is a good marker of protein and amino-acid degradation under stress conditions, accumulated considerably until 45 h of starvation and accounted for 50% of the nitrogen released by protein degradation at that time. After 45 h of starvation, nitrogen ceased to be stored in asparagine and was excreted from the cell, first as ammonia until 90-100 h and then, when starvation had become irreversible, as amino acids and aminated compounds. The study of asparagine metabolism and nitrogen-assimilation pathways throughout starvation showed that: (i) asparagine synthesis occurred via asparagine synthetase (EC 6.3.1.1) rather than asparagine aminotransferase (EC 2.6.1.14) or the β-cyanoalanine pathway, and asparagine degradation occurred via asparaginase (EC 3.5.1.1); and (ii) the enzymic activities related to nitrogen reduction and assimilation and amino-acid synthesis decreased continuously, whereas glutamate dehydrogenase (EC 1.4.1.2-4) activities increased during the reversible period of starvation. Considered together, metabolite analysis and enzymic-activity measurements showed that starvation may be divided into three phases: (i) the acclimation phase (0 to 30-35 h) in which the root tips adapt to transient sugar deprivation and partly store the nitrogen released by protein degradation, (ii) the survival phase (30-35 to 90-100 h) in which the root tips expel the nitrogen released by protein degradation and starvation may be reversed by sugar addition and (iii) the cell-disorganization phase (beyond 100 h) in which all metabolites and enzymic activities decrease and the root tips die.

The plant enzyme S-adenosylmethionine:methionine S-methyltransferase (EC 2.1.1.12, MMT) catalyzes the synthesis of S-methylmethionine. MMT was purified 620-fold to apparent homogeneity from leaves of Wollastonia biflora. The four-step purification included fractionation with polyethylene glycol, affinity chromatography on adenosine-agarose, anion exchange chromatography, and gel filtration. Protein yield was about 180 g/kg of leaves. Estimates of molecular mass from sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis and native gel filtration chromatography were, respectively, 115 and 450 kDa, suggesting a tetramer of 115-kDa subunits. The 115-kDa subunit was photoaffinity labeled by S-adenosyl[ 3 H]methionine. Antibodies raised against W. biflora MMT recognized a 115-kDa polypeptide in partially purified MMT preparations from leaves of lettuce, cabbage, clover, and maize.The pH optimum of W. biflora MMT was 7.2. Kinetic analysis of substrate interaction and product inhibition patterns indicated an Ordered Bi Bi mechanism, with S-adenosylmethionine the first reactant to bind and Sadenosylhomocysteine the last product to be released. The enzyme catalyzed methylation of selenomethionine and ethionine, but not of S-methylcysteine, homocysteine, cysteine, or peptidylmethionine. Tests with other substrate analogs indicated that a free carboxyl group was required for enzyme activity, and that a free amino group was not.

3-Dimethylsulfoniopropionate

An endopeptidase (designated RSIP, for root-starvation-induced protease) was purified to homogeneity from glucose-starved maize roots. The molecular mass of the enzyme was 59 kDa by SDS/PAGE under reducing conditions and 62 kDa by gel filtration on a Sephacryl S-200 column. The isoelectric point of RSIP was 4.55. The purified enzyme was stable, with no auto-proteolytic activity. The enzyme activity was strongly inhibited by proteinaceous trypsin inhibitors, di-isopropylfluorophosphate, 3,4-dichloroisocoumarin and PMSF, suggesting that the enzyme is a serine protease. The maximum proteolytic activity against different protein substrates occurred at pH 6.5. With the exception of succinyl-Leu-Leu-Val-Tyr-4-methylcoumarin, no hydrolysis was detected with synthetic tryptic, chymotryptic or peptidylglutamate substrates. The determination of the cleavage sites in the oxidized B-Chain of insulin showed specificity for hydrophobic residues at the P2 and P3 positions, indicating that RSIP is distinct from other previously characterized maize endopeptidases. Both subcellular fractionation and immuno-detection in situ indicated that RSIP is localized in the vacuole of the root cells. RSIP is the first vacuolar serine endopeptidase to be identified. Glucose starvation induced RSIP: after 4 days of starvation, RSIP was estimated to constitute 80% of total endopeptidase activity in the root tip. These results suggest that RSIP is implicated in vacuolar autophagic processes triggered by carbon limitation.

3-Dimethylsulfoniopropionate (DMSP) is an osmoprotectant compound that serves as the biogenic precursor of dimethyl sulfide (DMS), an important atmospheric sulfur gas. DMSP is known to be accumulated by many marine algae but has been little studied in higher plants; it has previously been identified in only four angiosperm genera (one genus from the Asteraceae and three from the Poaceae), at levels of about 5 to 30 μmol g−1 fresh weight. Leaves of 177 species of angiosperms representing 90 families from 55 orders were screened for DMSP. An indirect assay was used in which DMSP treated with a cold NaOH solution released acrylic acid and DMS, the latter being analyzed by gas chromatography. The detection limit was 0.01 μmol g−1 fresh weight. Twenty-nine species (from 22 families and 22 orders) had detectable levels of DMSP, all fairly low (≤ 1 μmol g−1 fresh weight). In vivo radiotracer labeling results indicated that species from the Asteraceae, Poaceae, and Rosaceae containing DMSP synthesize it from methionine via S-methylmethionine, and that this pathway may be present at a low level in species of Asteraceae that do not accumulate detectable amounts of DMSP. Taken together, these data imply that the capacity for DMSP production is widespread among Angiosperms. Key words: 3-dimethylsulfonioproprionate, S-methylmethionine, dimethyl sulfide.

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