Polysaccharides and lipids in microsporocytes and tapetum of Rhoeo discolor Hance. Cytochemical study

Abstract

The present report, which mainly presents cytochemical results, establishes the determination, localisation and evolution of the cytoplasmic and wall polysaccharides and lipids in the microsporocytes and the plasmodial tape turn of Rhoeo discolor Hance. Enzymatic controls, use of autoradiographic methods, and electron microscopy, have proved the validity of our cytochemical results and permitted to precise these results. In the microsporocytes and pollen grains, the callosic special wall, the carotenoid exine, the pectocellulosic cellulasic in tine, and the callosic and pectic young curved wail. between the generative cell and the vegetative cell, have mainly held our attention. As for the tapetum which remains poor in insoluble polysacharides till the ultimate stages of microsporogenesis, it grows richer in choline - phospholipids during meiosis and, more lightly, in carotenoids beyond the tetrad stage; the periplasmodium does not seem to participate directly in the increase of exine lipids.