Effect of phosphorus deficiency on levels of phosphorus compounds in spirodela

When Spirodela plants are transferred to a phosphate-deficient medium, growth slows down immediately, and ceases after 14 days. During this time, inorganic phosphate content falls from 30 to 0.7 μmoles/g fresh weight of tissue, phosphate ester content from 3.5 to 0.6 μmoles/g, phospholipid content from 3.5 to 1.2 μmoles/g, and residual phosphate (mainly RNA) content from 7.5 to 2.0 μmoles/g. Relative proportions of the various phosphate esters, and relative proportions of the various phospholipids, are not markedly affected by phosphate deficiency. Turnover rates of phosphate esters are somewhat higher in phosphate-deficient tissue. In control tissue, inorganic phosphate is present in 2 pools; a metabolic (12%) and a non-metabolic pool (88%). In phosphate-deficient tissues, most of the inorganic phosphate (>90%) is in the metabolic pool. Non-metabolic phosphate is presumably stored in the vacuole, and is not readily accessible to the tissue, so that growth normally occurs at the expense of external phosphate. During deficiency, growth is limited by the rate at which phosphate can be transported through the tonoplast and tissue to the growing point. Growth ceases when the supply of non-metabolic phosphate is exhausted. Metabolic phosphate is presumably located in the cytoplasm: it can not be used for growth. Nor can the plant respond to deficiency by making some phosphorus compounds at the expense of others. In this respect, phosphorus deficiency and nitrogen deficiency are dissimilar.     

Biological formation of volatile phosphorus compounds

Phosphine and phosphides are reported to occur at numerous environmental sites such as fresh and marine sediments, landfills, faecal matter, biogas digesters and soils. The concentrations are several log units lower than the time-weighted average exposure standard, i.e. in the order of ng per m3 of gas or ng per kg material. Research about the biological formation of highly reduced gaseous phosphorus compounds dates back more than a hundred years. The early reports had to deal with a lot of scepticism. Thanks to new analytical tools (gas chromatography) it has become clear, during the last decade, that phosphine is a global constituent of the atmosphere. Pure strains of micro-organisms cultivated under highly anaerobic conditions were shown to produce phosphine. Thermodynamic considerations indicate that it is very improbable that the reduction of phosphate to phosphine is endergonic. Therefore the generation of phosphine cannot be compared with sulphidogenesis and methanogenesis. There seems to be a link between the existence of highly reactive gaseous phosphorus compounds and increased levels of metal corrosion. The reactive compounds could be formed by micro-organisms or they are liberated from phosphorus-containing impurities in the iron by the action of bacterial metabolites. The biochemical pathways responsible for the production of gaseous phosphorus compounds have not been characterised yet.     

Acid-soluble phosphorus compounds in mammalian semen

1. A method is described for the extraction, purification and separation of acid-soluble phosphorus compounds from mammalian semen. [8-(14)C]ATP and [8-(14)C]AMP were used as internal recovery standards to measure the breakdown and loss of these nucleotides in the procedure. 2. Bull, ram, boar and stallion semen was separated into seminal plasma and spermatozoa and the two fractions were examined separately. The overall composition of the mixture of the phosphorus compounds extracted from the two fractions was similar for the four species. 3. Glycerylphosphorylcholine and glycerylphosphorylinositol were the two phosphorus compounds identified in extracts of seminal plasma. ATP, ADP, AMP, GTP, GDP, NAD, fructose 1,6-diphosphate and glucose 6-phosphate were identified in extracts prepared from spermatozoa.     

Distribution of phosphorus compounds in corn processing

Distillers dried grains with solubles (DDGS) and corn gluten feed (CGF) are major coproducts of ethanol production from corn dry grind and wet milling facilities, respectively. These coproducts contain important nutrients, nevertheless, high levels of phosphorus (P). About 50-80% of the P in these products is in an organically bound form known as phytate. The phytate P in these products cannot be digested by nonruminant animals. Consequently, large quantities of phytate are deposited into the soil with the animal wastes which potentially could cause P pollution in soil and underground water resources. As regulations on the concentration of P material in ethanol production coproducts become more restrictive, measures need to be taken for effective extraction of phytate P from the coproducts to make these processes more environmentally compatible. Proper marketing of coproducts is critical to the overall economy of ethanol production facilities. In this study, distribution of P compounds in different streams of dry grind and wet milling operations was determined. In the dry grind process, the highest P concentration was found to be in the condensed distillers solubles (CDS) at about 1.34 wt.% (db). About 59% of P in this stream was in phosphates form. The highest concentration of P in the wet milling process was found in the light steep water at about 3.4 wt.% (db). In this stream, about 22% of P was attributed to phosphates.