Home page 2010 Plant Omics Journal http://www.pomics.com/index.html/ en http://www.pomics.com/july2010.html Sun, 25 Jul 2010 21:16:05 GMT Hashemabadi D and Kaviani B<br><br>Abstract<br><br>The essential oils extracted from stems and leaves of Eryngium caucasicum Trautv., by hydrodistillation method. The samples were collected from different coastal and hill slope locations at various vegetative phases. The composition of essential oils was analysed by gas chromatography (GC) and gas chromatography, coupled to mass spectrometry (GC-MS). Totally, fifty eight volatile compounds were identified in stem and leave oils. Quantitative and qualitative differences were also found among the analysed parts. The ß-sesquiphellandrene (44.21%), limonene (18.39%) and ß-bisabolene (6.08%) were dominant components, respectively, at vegetative phase (May 2009) in the leaves of coastal plants, while 5-methyl-2-pyrimidone (53.83%), ß-sesquiphellandrene (11.26%) and ß-bisabolene (7.43%) were dominant components in hill slope plants. The main components of the essential oils in leaves of coastal plants at vegetative phase (June 2009) were ß-sesquiphellandrene (27.32%), limonene (14.32%) and 5-methyl-2-pyrimidone (14.15%). On the hill slope, plant components were 4(5)-acetyl-1H-imidazole (50.14%), ß-sesquiphellandrene (15.51%) and 4-(1,5-dimethylhex-4-enyl) cyclohex-2-enone (11.05%). The Hexadecahydro-cyclobuta [1,2,3,4] dicyclooctene (45.46%), ß-sesquiphellan- drene (20.5%) and widdrene (19.06%) were dominant components at generative phase (July 2009) in the stems of coastal plants, while piperiton (69.81%), 4-(1,5-dimethylhex-4-enyl) cyclohex-2-enone (18.38%) and ß-sesquiphellandrene (4.54%) were dominant components on hill slope plants. The main components of the essential oils were sesquiterpenes. This study shows that type and concentration of components can be remarkably changed, based on vegetation phase and location. This can help us to be more selective in our extraction strategy. http://www.pomics.com/july2010.html Sun, 25 Jul 2010 21:15:21 GMT R.M. Pandey and Rekha Singh<br><br>Abstract<br><br>Twenty six accessions of grain Amaranth (Amaranthus hypochondriacus L.) were evaluated for salient biochemical and quantitative traits particularly reference to chlorophyll a and b, total chlorophyll, phenol content, leaf moisture, leaf protein content, test weight and yield plant-1. Genetic divergence and association among these traits were analysed. Chlorophyll a, chlorophyll b, total chlorophyll and phenol content showed significantly higher values for all the accessions studied indicating thereby that these accessions can be successfully utilized for the improvement of these characters in this crop. Leaf protein content revealed exceptional attributes for ameliorating protein deficiency strictly in the diet of vegetarian people. Leaf protein content was noted significant in four accessions, namely AG-67/1 (3.152 mg g-1), AG-21 (2.452 mg g-1), AG-306 (2.101 mg g-1) and AG-1175 (2.101 mg g-1). Accessions with more leaf protein have potential to increase nutritional value and can be utilized for vegetable purposes. However, knowledge about amaranth leaf composition is still marginal. Using Euclidean cluster analysis 26 accessions were distributed in 3 clusters (at 9.0 euclidean distance) of which cluster I contained maximum (13) accessions, cluster II (10) and cluster III (3) accessions. The determination of chemical composition of leaf is necessary for variety evaluation, on the basis of high nutritive value for human diet. Biochemical characters had no significant genetic association with grain yield plant-1 which revealed that biochemical traits can be improved without altering grain yield. Cluster I and III were found more diverse than others and therefore can be used for developing recombinants. http://www.pomics.com/july2010.html Sun, 25 Jul 2010 21:14:38 GMT Sanchita Gupta, Rishi Shukla, Sudeep Roy, Naresh Sen, Ashok Sharma<br><br>Abstract <br><br>The simple sequence repeats (SSRs) were extracted from 23,260 expressed sequence tags (ESTs) of Ocimum basilicum, a plant of great medicinal value. The results revealed that 447 SSRs were identified, out of which number of di, tri, tetra, penta, and hexanucletide SSRs were 212, 215, 17, 1 and 2 respectively. The SSRs occur in UTR (Untranslated Regions) are slightly more than coding region. The SSRs containing ESTs (SSR-ESTs) were functionally annotated with the help of BLASTx program at NCBI server. In this study, 21.44 % SSR-ESTs could be assigned a significant match of translated SSR-EST query with protein databases. 58 primer pairs associated with SSR-ESTs were designed. These primers will be used further as markers to study transferability to related species. The study of functional domain markers (FDM) can provide information of functional property of microsatellite markers and predicted protein domains. 398 SSR-FDM were designed for significant functional domains. These findings will help to analyze molecular markers that have functional importance and should also facilitate the analysis of genetic diversity in plants especially medicinal plants. http://www.pomics.com/july2010.html Sun, 25 Jul 2010 21:13:54 GMT Nam Il Park, Jee Hee Park, Chung Yeol Lee, Sook Young Lee and Sang Un Park <br><br>Abstract<br><br>Korean Angelica (Angelica gigas) produces pyranocoumarins (decursin and decursinol angelate), which have neuroprotective, anticancer, and anti-androgen receptor-signaling activities. An efficient protocol for the establishment of transgenic Angelica gigas root cultures using Agrobacterium rhizogenes is reported. To further characterise the putative transgenic roots, explant tissues were co-cultivated with A. rhizogenes strain R1601 carrying the pK2GW7-GUS binary vector. Except for the co-cultivation medium, all formulations included 50 mg L-1 kanamycin to select for transformants and 250 mg L-1 cefotaxime to eliminate the Agrobacterium. After 6 to 8 weeks co-cultivation with Agrobacterium rhizogenes, kanamycin-resistant roots appeared on 50% of explants maintained on hormone-free medium. Isolated hairy roots were transferred in liquid medium containing half-strength Schenk and Hildebrandt (SH) salt and 30 mg L-1 sugar. Detection of the neomycin phosphotransferase gene, high levels of ß--glucuronidase (GUS) transcripts, and GUS histochemical localisation confirmed the integrative transformation. In the future, these protocols should facilitate the extraction and study of valuable metabolites, such as decursin and decursinol angelate from A. gigas hairy root cultures. http://www.pomics.com/july2010.html Sun, 25 Jul 2010 21:13:09 GMT Masoumeh Khalili, Tahereh Hasanloo, Seyyed Kamal Kazemi Tabar<br><br>Abstract<br><br>Seeds of Silybum marianum have been used to treat liver diseases. Active component of these seeds is silymarin. Hairy root cultures of S. marianum could be able to produce silymarin. There is evidence that the use of elicitors has been an important strategy for improving the production of secondary metabolite. Elicitation is interesting to investigate cell signaling pathway in secondary metabolite biosynthesis. Lipoxiganase is an important enzyme in octadecanoid pathway to the biosynthesis of jasmonic acid. The most research results have been shown the relationship between elicitors and jasmonic acid signaling pathways. For this we examined Silymarin accumulation, linoleic acid content and lopoxigenas activity in hairy roots of S. marianum induced through the use of an abiotic elicitor, Ag+. Hairy root cultures of S. marianum were feeding by different concentration of Ag+ (0.2, 0.4, 0.8, 1 and 2 mM) and harvested 72h after elicitation. Detection and identification of flavonolignans was carried out by high performance liquid chromatograph method. The highest content of silymarin was 0.56 mg g -1 DW that was obtained with 2 mM of Ag+ that was 2 times of non-treated hairy roots. Then hairy roots were treated with 2 mM Ag+ for different times (0, 24, 48, 72, 96 and 120h). The highest silymarin production reached to 1.2 mg g -1 DW, 96h after elicitation. The content of silybin, isosilybin, taxifolin, silycristin and silydianin were 0.069, 0.031, 0.688, 0.388 and 0.024 mg g -1 DW, respectively. The maximum lipoxigenase activity was obtained 72h after elicitation that was 4.33 times of non-treated hairy roots. Linoleic acid content was 19.9 mg g -1 DW, 96h after elicitation. Dry weight of treated hairy roots decreased, as compared to non-treated hairy roots. It is feasible that elicitation with Ag+ changes lipoxigenase activity that medial signal transduction pathway for production of silymarin.