ABA synthesis in protoplasts of different origin in response to osmotic stress

All the protoplasts analysed in this study whatever the original plant material were able to accumulate ABA under osmotic stress. The time course of ABA accumulation strongly differed according to the plant material. In both rose petal or Amaranthus leaf protoplasts, the increase in ABA level was significant but transient. Protoplasts prepared from Amaranthus cell suspensions behaved differently, showing a late and durable accumulation of ABA. Similar patterns of changes in ABA accumulation were observed in the original plant material under osmotic stress. A pretreatment of plant material by fluridone induced a strong inhibition of ABA accumulation whatever the origin of protoplasts was. This result suggests that ABA could be synthesised via the carotenoid pathway in the absence of the cell wall.     

Patch-clamp study of vascular plant chloroplasts: Ion channels and photocurrents

This article presents direct measurements of large-conductance cation channel (G=730 pS in 100/50mM KCl; =2.8) and light-induced current (photocurrent) in chloroplasts from C₄ plants,Amaranthus hybridus andZea mays, using the conventional patch-clamp technique. It was shown that preillumination of chloroplast gave rise to a fast decaying transient ( 6 ms) in the light-induced current for the second and following light pulses. This transient increase of photocurrent was interpreted as a consequence of photoreducing of the redox pool between photosystems.     

Specificity ofAmaranthus leucocarpus lectin

We have demonstrated thatAmaranthus leucocarpus lectin hemagglutinating activity was powerfully inhibited by the T-antigen, containing Gal(1–3)GalNAc(1–3)Ser/Thr, and the T_n-antigen, which contains GalNAc(1–3)Ser/Thr. This suggests that the acetamido group at C-2 and the axial -OH at C-4 of theN-acetyl-D-galactopyranosylamine ring are important for lectin binding. The hemagglutination assays also established that desialylated and Pronase-treated human typeO erythrocytes with an M phenotype were better recognized than erythrocytes from all other blood groups. The recognition was dependent on pH and ionic strength.     

黄色小长蝽在美国籽粒苋上的发生及防治

黄色小长蝽除危害苋科外,还危害菊科、禾本科等作物。该虫在嘉兴1年发生4～5代。夏季高温,成虫寿命长,若虫、卵历期短,世代重叠,为害重;秋季转凉,若虫、卵历期长,为害轻。防治上采用农业与药剂防治相结合,效果良好。     

Stimulatory effect of ethephon,ACC, gibberellin A3 and A4+7 on germination of methyl jasmonate inhibited Amaranthus caudatus L. seeds

Methyl jasmonate (JA-Me) inhibited or retarded germination of Amaranthus caudatus seeds in darkness at 24°C, Ethephon, ACC and gibberellins (GA₃ or GA₄₊₇) partially or completely reversed this inhibition depending on the concentration of JA-Me applied. Both ethephon and the gibberellins were more effective than ACC. Both GA₃ and GA₄₊₇ enhanced the stimulatory effect of ethephon or ACC on germination of seeds inhibited by JA-Me.Abbreviations ACC 1-aminocyclopropane-1-carboxylic acid - JA jasmonic acid - JA-Me methyl jasmonate     

中国苋科苋属新记录种——鲍氏苋和布氏苋

我国有记录的苋属植物20余种,主要为外来杂草。苋属植物形态相近,常被误鉴。作者从送检的误鉴的标本中发现2个新外来种,根据拉丁文名种加词释义,分别命名为鲍氏苋(Amaranthus powellii S. Watson)和布氏苋(A. bouchonii Thell.)。鲍氏苋和布氏苋形态相近,分别产自美国西南部和欧洲,雌雄同株,具3～5雌花花被片,花被片不等长,等于或短于胞果,胞果开裂或不开裂。鲍氏苋和布氏苋可通过花被片数目和形态、胞果是否开裂、苞片大小相区分。该文还提供了鲍氏苋和布氏苋的中文形态描述及彩色图片,并对其分布、生境和危害状况进行了报道。     

苋菜AtGAI基因克隆及表达分析

为研究苋菜赤霉素不敏感基因(AtGAI)对赤霉素的响应,采用RT-PCR结合RACE技术,从‘大红’苋菜(Amaranthus tricolor L.‘Dahong’)中克隆得到一个GAI基因,命名为AtGAI(GenBank登录号为MK049175)。结果表明:(1)苋菜AtGAI基因含一个1 818bp开放阅读框,编码605个氨基酸。(2)生物信息学分析表明,苋菜AtGAI含2个保守结构域DELLA和GRAS,有GAI家族特有序列特征。(3)系统进化树分析表明,苋菜AtGAI蛋白与籽粒苋GAI蛋白亲缘关系最近。(4)显微观察及色素含量分析表明,甜菜色素主要分布于子叶和下胚轴的表皮及维管束鞘周围的薄壁细胞中,GA_3浓度与甜菜色素含量呈负相关。(5)qRT-PCR分析结果表明,GA_3抑制AtGAI、AmMYB1、AmaDODA和AmCYP76AD1基因在子叶和下胚轴中的表达。研究表明,GA_3可能通过影响AtGAI基因的表达来调控苋菜甜菜色素代谢。     

Changes in concentrations of soluble carbohydrates during germination of <Emphasis Type="Italic">Amaranthus caudatus</Emphasis> L. seeds in relation to ethylene,gibberellin A<Subscript>3</Subscript> and methyl jasmonate

Unimbibed Amaranthus caudatus seeds were found to contain stachyose, raffinose, verbascose, sucrose, galactinol, myo-inositol, glucose and fructose, while no galactose, maltose and maltotriose was detected. During imbibition, seed concentrations of verbascose, stachyose, raffinose, galactinol, myo-inositol (temporary) and fructose (transient) were observed to decrease; concentrations of galactose and maltose remained fairly constant, while those of sucrose, glucose and maltotriose increased, the increase in sucrose concentration was only temporary. Effects of gibberellin A₃ (GA₃) at 3 × 10⁻⁴ M and ethephon at 3 × 10⁻⁴ M alone or in the presence of methyl jasmonate (Me-JA) at 10⁻³ M on concentrations of soluble sugars during germination of A. caudatus seeds were examined. Me-JA was found to inhibit seed germination and fresh weight of the seeds, but did not affect sucrose, myo-inositol, galactose and maltose concentrations during imbibition for up to 20 h. The exogenously applied GA₃ was observed to enhance germination, stachyose breakdown and glucose concentration after 20 h of incubation. Ethephon stimulated seed germination as well as utilisation of stachyose, galactinol (both after 14 and 20 h) and raffinose (after 14 h of incubation). Although the stimulatory effect of either GA₃ or ethephon on seed germination was blocked by Me-JA; these stimulators increased mobilisation of raffinose and stachyose, but only ethephon enhanced both glucose and fructose after 14 and/or 20 h of incubation in the presence of Me-JA. The maltose concentration was increased by both GA₃ and ethephon alone and in the presence of Me-JA. Of the growth regulators studied, ethephon alone and/or in combination with Me-JA significantly increased the concentrations of glucose, fructose, galactose, maltose and maltotriose. The differences in sugar metabolism appear to be linked to ethylene or GA₃ applied simultaneously with Me-JA.     

Photorespiratory metabolism of glyoxylate and formate in glycine-accumulating mutants of barley and Amaranthus edulis

Glycine-accumulating mutants of barley (Hordeum vulgare L.) and Amaranthus edulis (Speg.), which lack the ability to decarboxylate glycine by glycine decarboxylase (GDC; EC 2.1.2.10), were used to study the significance of an alternative photorespiratory pathway of serine formation. In the normal photorespiratory pathway, 5,10-methylenetetrahydrofolate is formed in the reaction catalysed by GDC and transferred to serine by serine hydroxymethyltransferase. In an alternative pathway, glyoxylate could be decarboxylated to formate and formate could be converted into 5,10-methylenetetrahydrofolate in the C1-tetrahydrofolate synthase pathway. In contrast to wild-type plants, the mutants showed a light-dependent accumulation of glyoxylate and formate, which was suppressed by elevated (0.7%) CO₂ concentrations. After growth in air, the activity and amount of 10-formyltetrahydrofolate synthetase (FTHF synthetase; EC 6.3.4.4), the first enzyme of the conversion of formate into 5,10-methylenetetrahydrofolate, were increased in the mutants compared to the wild types. A similar increase in FTHF synthetase could be induced by incubating leaves of wild-type plants with glycine under illumination, but not in the dark. Experiments with ¹⁴C showed that the barley mutants incorporated [¹⁴C]formate and [2-¹⁴C]glycollate into serine. Together, the accumulation of glyoxylate and formate under photorespiratory conditions, the increase in FTHF synthetase and the ability to utilise formate and glycollate for the formation of serine indicate that the mutants are able partially to compensate for the lack of GDC activity by bypassing the normal photorespiratory pathway. Received: 14 August 1998 / Accepted: 30 September 1998     

Low-Cot DNA sequences for fingerprinting analysis of germplasm diversity and relationships in Amaranthus

We examined genetic diversity and relationships among 24 cultivated and wild Amaranthus accessions using the total low-Cot DNA and five individual repetitive sequences as probes. These low-Cot DNA probes were obtained by the isolation of various classes of repetitive-DNA sequences, including satellites, minisatellites, microsatellites, rDNA, retrotransposon-like sequences, and other unidentified novel repetitive sequences. DNA fingerprints generated by different types of repetitive-DNA probes revealed different levels of polymorphism in the Amaranthus genomes. A repetitive sequence containing microsatellites was found to be a suitable probe for characterizing intraspecific accessions, whereas more conservative sequences (e.g. rDNA) were informative for resolving phylogenetic relationships among distantly related species.Genetic diversity, measured as restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) and the similarity index at the low-Cot DNA level, was equally high among intraspecific accessions between the two species groups: grain amaranths (A. caudatus, A. cruentus, and A. hypochondriacus) and their putative wild progenitors (A. hybridus, A. powellii, and A. quitensis). At the interspecific level, however, the grain amaranth species are less divergent from each other than their wild progenitors. With the rare exceptions of certain A. caudatus accessions, grain amaranths were found to be closely related to A. hybridus. The results based on low-Cot DNA were comparable with previous RAPD and isozyme studies of the same set of species/accessions of Amaranthus, indicating that low-Cot DNA sequences are suitable probes for a fingerprinting analysis of plant germplasm diversity and for determining phylogenetic relationships. Received: 19 October 1998 / Accepted: 8 January 1999