Strategies for Measuring Cytosolic Sugar Concentrations in Plant Cells

Abstract

The primary products of plant photosynthesis are soluble sugars such as glucose, fructose, and sucrose. These form the basis of every cell's carbon and energy metabolism. One major limitation for the investigation of soluble sugar metabolism is the difficulty associated with measuring their concentrations in different subcellular compartments. This applies especially to the cytosol, the site of many important enzymatic reactions, as it typically only fills a thin area between the vacuole and plasma membrane. In this article, we discuss the advantages and disadvantages of methods that have been used to probe cytosolic sugar concentrations, including microautoradiography, plasmolysis, non‐aqueous fractionation, Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) microspectroscopy, Raman microspectroscopy, mass spectrometry imaging, Förster resonance energy transfer (FRET) nanosensors, direct sampling, and theoretical modelling. Perspectives regarding different use cases and future developments are provided.

Molecular Level Sucrose Quantification: A Critical Review

“…The main difficulties for ultra-low sucrose quantification in plants are selectivity, low molecular weight, high solvation, and electroneutrality at pH 7.4 [ 20 ]. Research and development for sucrose quantification have mainly been applied to food quality control assessments, which require high selectivity, albeit low detection limits are not imperative.…”