[Observations on the chloroplast pigments and the structure of the chloroplasts in the green petals of Deherainia smaragdina (Planch.) Decne].

1. The petals of Deherainia smaragdina [Theophrastaceae] are green just like the foliage leaves. They contain a smaller amount of chloroplast pigments than the foliage leaves, but the composition of these pigments does not essentially deviate from the pigment composition of the foliage leaves. The esterified xanthophyll (N) is to be found only in traces. In an earlier investigation (SCHöTZ, 1962) we determined this xanthophyll in the petals of Oenothera suaveolens "Weißherz", in which it is produced in a very large quantity. 2. The green petals of Deherainia smaragdina differ from the foliage leaves by their unifacial construction, by the presence of hydathodes instead of stomata on their abaxial surface, by the smaller number of chloroplasts per cell, and by the smaller size of the chloroplasts (Fig. 4 and 5). However, the structure of the chloroplasts seen in the light microscope is the same in both leaf organs. The chloroplasts are unusually large and have a diameter of about 20 μ in the foliage leaves. 3. Like the chloroplasts of the foliage leaves (Fig. 6), the fully developed chloroplasts of the petals of Deherainia smaragdina also possess a well developed thylakoid system, the extremely large grana of which (Fig. 7a and b) may consist of 60 and more single thylakoids in very close superposition. In addition the chloroplasts still contain one or a few prolamellar bodies of a size up to 2 μ, which thus do not disappear here as they normally do during the development of the thylakoid system (Fig. 7 and 8).