Publikationen - Molekulare Signalverarbeitung

Plants are sessile organisms. Consequently they have to adapt constantly to fluctuations in the environment. Some of these changes involve essential factors such as nutrients, light, and water. Plants have evolved independent systems to sense nutrients such as phosphate and nitrogen. However, many of the environmental factors may reach levels which represent stress for the plant. The fluctuations can range between moderate and unfavorable, and the factors can be of biotic or abiotic origin. Among the biotic factors influencing plant life are pathogens and herbivores. In case of bacteria and fungi, symbiotic interactions such as nitrogen-fixating nodules and mycorrhiza, respectively, may be established. In case of insects, a tritrophic interaction of herbivores, carnivores, and plants may occur mutualistically or parasitically. Among the numerous abiotic factors are low temperature, frost, heat, high light conditions, ultraviolet light, darkness, oxidation stress, hypoxia, wind, touch, nutrient imbalance, salt stress, osmotic adjustment, water deficit, and desiccation.In the last decade jasmonates were recognized as being signals in plant responses to most of these biotic and abiotic factors. Signaling via jasmonates was found to occur intracellularly, and systemically as well as interorganismically. Jasmonates are a group of ubiquitously occurring plant growth regulators originally found as the major constituents in the etheric oil of jasmine, and were first suggested to play a role in senescence due to a strong senescence-promoting effect. Subsequently, numerous developmental processes were described in which jasmonates exhibited hormone-like properties. Recent knowledge is reviewed here on jasmonates and their precursors, the octadecanoids. After discussing occurrence and biosynthesis, emphasis is placed upon the signal transduction pathways in plant stress responses in which jasmonates act a signal. Finally, examples are described on the role of jasmonates in developmental processes.

Lipid bodies are degraded during germination. Whereas some proteins, e.g. oleosins, are synthesized during the formation of lipid bodies of maturating seeds, a new set of proteins, including a specific form of lipoxygenase (LOX; EC 1.13.11.12), is detectable in lipid bodies during the stage of fat degradation in seed germination. In cotyledons of cucumber (Cucumis sativus L.) seedlings at day 4 of germination, the most conspicuous staining with anti-LOX antibodies was observed in the cytosol. At very early stages of germination, however, the LOX form present in large amounts and synthesized preferentially was the lipid-body LOX. This was demonstrated by immunocytochemical staining of cotyledons from 1-h and 24-h-old seedlings: the immunodecoration of sections of 24-h-old seedlings with anti-LOX antiserum showed label exclusively correlated with lipid bodies of around 3 μm in diameter. In accordance, the profile of LOX protein isolated from lipid bodies during various stages of germination showed a maximum at day 1. By measuring biosynthesis of the protein in vivo we demonstrated that the highest rates of synthesis of lipid-body LOX occurred at day 1 of germination. The early and selective appearance of a LOX form associated with lipid bodies at this stage of development is discussed.