Degeneration of leaf cells resulting from starvation after excision. I. Electron microscopic observations

Abstract

Mesophyll cells of Nicotiana glutinosa exposed to starvation in the light after leaf excision showed the following major changes: vacuolation of the cytoplast; rearrangement of chloroplast and nuclear material; accumulation of cytoplasmic crystals and of starch; evagination and increased perforation of the nuclear membrane; and lysis of the tonoplast. Rearrangement of chloroplast material resulted in extended, 3-dimensional arrays (pseudocrystalline bodies), composed of electron-dense globules 85–100 Å in diameter. The ultrastructural degeneration of cells within a leaf was unsynchronized, and the sequence of degenerative intracellular events was not fixed. These observations are compatible with an unequal distribution of "essential" metabolites among those cells. Cells suffering from starvation stress showed ultrastructural changes not observed in cells of aging attached leaves and vice versa. Thus, starvation stress does not merely accelerate the process of cell-aging, as it operates in attached leaves.