Arabinogalactan proteins are a diverse group of plant cell wall-associated proteoglycans. While structural and molecular genetic analyses have contributed to the emerging improved understanding of the wide-range of biological processes in which AGPs are implicated; the abil ...
Undoubtedly, the function of the plant cell wall in the control of cell growth far exceeds its mechanical role. The plant’s monitoring of cell wall function and integrity comprises a central checkpoint to integrate cues for survival and division, expansion and differentiation, as well as flu ...
Structural proteins of the primary cell wall present unusual but interesting problems for structural biologists in particular and plant biologists in general. As structure is the key to function; then the biochemical isolation of these glycoproteins for further study is paramount. H ...
Gluconacetobacter xylinus synthesises cellulose in an analogous fashion to plants. Through fermentation of Ga. xylinus in media containing cell wall polysaccharides from the hemicellulose and/or pectin families, composites with cellulose can be produced. These serve as gene ...
Studies of the mobilities of polysaccharides or parts of polysaccharides in a cell-wall preparation may give clues about the molecular interactions among the polysaccharides in the cell wall and the relative locations of polysaccharides within the cell wall. A number of solid-state 13C ...
Atomic force microscopy (AFM) can be used to obtain high-resolution images on a wide variety of materials. Unfortunately, plant cell wall material is typically too rough to be imaged as native tissue by AFM. Small tissue fragments can be produced through careful ball milling. These fragments can ...
Biosynthesis of pectin and hemicelluloses occurs in the Golgi apparatus and is thought to involve spatial regulations and complex formation of biosynthetic enzymes and proteins. We have demonstrated that a combination of heterologous expression of recombinant proteins tagged ...
Plant cells are delimited by a rigid cell wall that resists internal turgor pressure, but extends with a remarkable degree of control that allows the cell to grow and acquire specific shapes. Live cell fluorescence microscopy systems have allowed an amazing view into the complex and dynamic liv ...
HVPE is an excellent and often overlooked method for obtaining objective and meaningful information about cell-wall “building blocks” and their metabolic precursors. It provides not only a means of analysis of known compounds but also an insight into the charge and/or mass of any unfamiliar ...
In today’s field of plant cell wall research, insights into the structure of wall components are obtained using many different techniques, ranging from spectroscopic and microscopic to chemical and biochemical. In this chapter, we describe one method: oligosaccharide mass profiling ...
The interaction of plants with their environment is very dynamic. Studying the underlying processes is important for understanding and modeling plant response to changing environmental conditions. Photosynthesis varies largely between different plants and at different lo ...
The Leaf Extraction and Analysis Framework Graphical User Interface (LEAF GUI) software is designed for biologists who wish to analyze the structure of vessel bundles (veins) in leaves. The software enables users to extract descriptive statistics on the dimensions and positions of leaf ...
Plant organ phenotyping by noninvasive video imaging techniques provides a powerful tool to assess physiological traits, circadian and diurnal rhythms, and biomass production. In particular, growth of individual plant organs is known to exhibit a high plasticity and occurs as a result ...
Advances in automated plant handling and image acquisition now make it possible to use digital imaging for the high-throughput phenotyping of plants. Various traits can be extracted from individual images. However, the potential of this technology lies in the acquisition of time series. ...
Time-resolved hypocotyl length measurements in seedlings have the potential to greatly aid genetic studies looking at light, hormone, and circadian regulation of cell expansion. Recently, several computer-based tools have been developed to quantify hypocotyl length during ph ...
Almost all plant cells are surrounded by glycan-rich cell walls, which form much of the plant body and collectively are the largest source of biomass on earth. Plants use polysaccharides for support, defense, signaling, cell adhesion, and as energy storage, and many plant glycans are also import ...
Lignocellulosic biomass is a source of low cost polysaccharides that some microbes can deconstruct and convert into liquid transportation fuel. Feedstocks vary in their ease of use depending on their source and handing. Estimating conversion amenability is useful to determine the ef ...
Here we describe a rapid high-throughput method for performing RNA interference (RNAi) in moss, in which phenotyping is performed within 1 week after transformation. The moss Physcomitrella patens is a great plant model system for reverse genetic studies due to its amenability to homolog ...
Interest in measuring the nuclear holoploid genome sizes of higher plants reflects not just the status of the nucleus as a defining characteristic of eukaryotic organisms. Higher plants also attract interest in that they display an unusually large range of genome sizes, current measurem ...
Analysis of plant volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and essential oils (EOs, collectively called the plant volatilome) is an invaluable technique in plant biology, as it provides the qualitative and quantitative composition of bioactive compounds. From a physiological standpo ...