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Asparagine Synthesis in Pea Leaves, and the Occurrence of an Asparagine Synthetase Inhibitor ¹

Biology Department and Institute of Biochemistry, Carleton University, Ottawa, Ontario K1S 5B6 Canada, Biochemistry Department, Rothamsted Experimental Station, Harpenden, Herts, AL5 2JQ United Kingdom

Asparagine is present in the mature leaves of young pea (Pisum sativum cv Little Marvel) seedlings, and is synthesized in detached shoots. This accumulation and synthesis is greatly enhanced by darkening. In detached control shoots, [¹⁴C]aspartate was metabolized predominantly to organic acids and, as other workers have shown, there was little labeling of asparagine (after 5 hours, 3.1% of metabolized label). Addition of the aminotransferase inhibitor aminooxyacetate decreased the flow of aspartate carbon to organic acids and enhanced (about 3-fold) the labeling of asparagine. The same treatment applied to darkened shoots resulted in a substantial conversion of [¹⁴C]aspartate to asparagine, over 10-fold greater than in control shoots (66% of metabolized label), suggesting that aspartate is the normal precursor of asparagine.

Only traces of glutamine-dependent asparagine synthetase activity could be detected in pea leaf or root extracts; activity was not enhanced by sulfhydryl reagents, oxidizing conditions, or protease inhibitors. Asparagine synthetase is readily extracted from lupin cotyledons, but yield was greatly reduced by extraction in the presence of pea leaf tissue; pea leaf homogenates contained an inhibitor which produced over 95% inhibition of an asparagine synthetase preparation from lupin cotyledons. The inhibitor was heat stable, with a low molecular weight. Presence of an inhibitor may prevent detection of asparagine synthetase in pea extracts and in Asparagus, where a cyanide-dependent pathway has been proposed to account for asparagine synthesis: an inhibitor with similar properties was present in Asparagus shoot tissue.

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