Is Guanosine Diphosphate-D-Glucose a Precursor of Cellulose ?

PARTICULATE enzyme preparations from bacteria1 and plants2,3 have been reported to catalyse the biosynthesis of high molecular weight β-1,4-linked glucan, chiefly cellulose, from either UDP-glucose or GDP-glucose. Partial hydrolysis of the polysaccharide formed from UDP-glucose, however, indicates the presence of β-1,3-linked glucose moieties4,5. Moreover, GDP-glucose is not found as a constituent of plant tissues that are actively forming cellulose6,7; and the enzyme system that utilizes GDP-glucose increases and decreases in catalytic activity as a function of the growth stage of the plant2,8, and these fluctuations do not coincide with the production of cellulose9. We now suggest that GDP-glucose is the in vivo precursor of a glucomannan rather than cellulose.

[1]  M. Marx‐Figini.  Comparison of the Biosynthesis of Cellulose in vitro and in vivo in Cotton Bolls , 1966, Nature.

[2]  W. Hassid,et al.  Biosynthesis of Alkali Insoluble Polysaccharide from UDP-d-Glucose with Particulate Enzyme Preparations from Phaseolus aureus. , 1967, Plant physiology.

[3]  A. Elbein,et al.  THE SYNTHESIS OF CELLULOSE BY ENZYME SYSTEMS FROM HIGHER PLANTS. , 1964, The Journal of biological chemistry.

[4]  P. Nordin,et al.  Soluble nucleotides of wheat and oat seedlings. , 1966, Archives of biochemistry and biophysics.

[5]  J. Kemp,et al.  Biosynthesis of cellulose in vitro from guanosine diphosphate D-glucose with enzymic preparations from Phaseolus aureus and Lupinus albus. , 1969, Journal of Biological Chemistry.

[6]  G. A. Barber,et al.  Synthesis of Cellulose by Enzyme Preparations from the Developing Cotton Boll , 1965, Nature.

[7]  M. Hall,et al.  Studies on Cellulose Synthesis by a Cell-free Oat Coleoptile Enzyme System: Inactivation by Airborne Oxidants. , 1967, Plant physiology.

[8]  A. Clark,et al.  A particle bound intermediate in the biosynthesis of plant cell wall polysaccharides. , 1969, Biochemical and biophysical research communications.

[9]  A. Gibbons,et al.  The enzymatic synthesis of cellulose by the higher plant lupinus albus , 1964 .

[10]  A. Elbein,et al.  Biosynthesis of a cell wall glucomannan in mung bean seedlings. , 1969, The Journal of biological chemistry.

[11]  L. Glaser.  The synthesis of cellulose in cell-free extracts of Acetobacter xylinum. , 1958, The Journal of biological chemistry.