Schilmiller Anthony L, Last Robert L, Pichersky Eran
Departments of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology and Plant Biology, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI 48824-1319, USA.
Plant J. 2008 May;54(4):702-11. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-313X.2008.03432.x.
Plant trichomes come in a variety of shapes, sizes and cellular composition. Some types, commonly called glandular trichomes, produce large amounts of specialized (secondary) metabolites of diverse classes. Trichomes are implicated in a variety of adaptive processes, including defense against herbivores and micro-organisms as well as in ion homeostasis. Because trichomes protrude from the epidermis and can often be easily separated from it and harvested, the mRNAs, proteins and small molecules that they contain are unusually accessible to analysis. This property makes them excellent experimental systems for identification of the enzymes and pathways responsible for the synthesis of the specialized metabolites found in these structures and sometimes elsewhere in the plant. We review the literature on the biochemistry of trichomes and consider the attributes that might make them highly useful targets for plant metabolic engineering.
植物毛状体具有多种形状、大小和细胞组成。某些类型，通常称为腺毛状体，能产生大量不同种类的特殊（次生）代谢产物。毛状体参与多种适应性过程，包括抵御食草动物和微生物以及离子稳态。由于毛状体从表皮突出，并且通常很容易从表皮分离并收获，因此它们所含的mRNA、蛋白质和小分子非常便于分析。这一特性使它们成为鉴定负责这些结构以及有时植物其他部位中发现的特殊代谢产物合成的酶和途径的优秀实验系统。我们综述了关于毛状体生物化学的文献，并考虑了可能使其成为植物代谢工程非常有用靶点的特性。
