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. 1979 Oct;64(4):623–629. doi: 10.1104/pp.64.4.623

Dimethylsulfoxide as a Potential Tool for Analysis of Compartmentation in Living Plant Cells 1

Deborah P Delmer a
PMCID: PMC543149  PMID: 16661021

Abstract

Data are presented which indicate that dimethylsulfoxide (DMSO) acts selectively on the plasma membrane of cultured tobacco cells, rendering it more permeable to small molecules, while having a far smaller effect on the permeability of the vacuolar membrane. The results which support this conclusion are: (a) DMSO (5 to 10%, by volume) causes complete release of [14C]tryptophan newly synthesized from [14C]indole while causing efflux of only about 20% of the total intracellular tryptophan pool; (b) similar concentrations of DMSO do not cause substantial release from these cells of phenolic compounds or preloaded neutral red, nor of β-cyanin from fresh beet discs; (c) kinetic studies of release of tryptophan and neutral sugars and of efflux of 86Rb+ show that DMSO selectively promotes rapid release of a portion of the total pool, followed by a substantially slower release of the remaining pool; (d) when tobacco cell protoplasts are incubated in the presence of 7.5% (by volume) DMSO, rapid lysis is observed concomitant with the release of intact vacuoles. These data indicate that a procedure involving a brief treatment of intact plant cells or tissues with DMSO may be used to assess the distribution of metabolites between cytoplasmic and vacuolar compartments.

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Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

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