New Zealand Journal of Crop and Horticultural Science abstracts
Short communication
Brief look at sorbitol in 1-year-old shoots of apple (Malus domestica)
Joanna C. Mcqueen1,2
Peter E. H. Minchin2,3
1Department of Biology
University of Waikato
Private Bag 3105
Hamilton, New Zealand
email: jmcqueen@waikato.ac.nz
2The Horticultural and Food Research
Institute of New Zealand Limited
Ruakura Research Centre
Private Bag 3123
Hamilton, New Zealand
3ICG-III Phytosphaere
Forschungszentrum Jülich
D 52425 Jülich, Germany
Abstract The sugar alcohol sorbitol is a major translocatory
product in most commercially important species in the Rosaceae family. Sugar
alcohols are thought to play a variety of roles in plant tissue, including
protecting metabolism during stress. Sorbitol has been found in high concentrations
in 1-year-old apple (Malus domestica) shoots, however studies have
shown that not all tissue throughout a tree has the ability to metabolise
sorbitol. In this study, we looked at sorbitol metabolism in 1-year-old apple
shoots using a variety of methods including carbohydrate depletion, metabolism
of 14C-sorbitol, and extraction of sorbitol dehydrogenase (SDH), the enzyme
necessary to convert sorbitol to fructose. Although starch stores were able
to be depleted in the shoot, sorbitol levels increased, corresponding to the
decrease in starch, resulting in little net loss of carbohydrate. 14C-sorbitol
was not metabolised and no SDH was found in shoot tissue, suggesting that
sorbitol has limited metabolism in 1-year-old apple shoots. Sorbitol may thus
be ideal for translocation in apple shoot tissue because of its ready movement
into the transport pathway, but its restricted utilisation there.
Keywords apple; sorbitol; SDH; metabolism
H04061; Online publication date 8 March 2005 Received 19 July 2004; accepted
29 November 2004
New Zealand Journal of Crop and Horticultural Science, 2005, Vol. 33:
81–87
0014-0671/05/3301-0081 © The Royal Society of New Zealand 2005
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