Chemical and ultrastructural studies on the distribution of sporopolleninlike biopolymers in six genera of lichen phycobionts

Abstract

Cell walls of cultured lichen phycobionts of the genera Coccomyxa, Elliptochloris, Myrmecia, Pseudochlorella, Trebouxia, and Trentepohlia were investigated with cytological and chemical methods with regard to the presence or absence of trilaminar sheaths and (or) resistant biopolymers. Trilaminar cell wall layers occurred in Coccomyxa, Elliptochloris, Myrmecia, and (less distinctly) Pseudochlorella species. A biopolymer highly resistant to nonoxidative degradation by phosphoric acid occurred only in the isolated and vigorously extracted cell walls of Coccomyxa and Elliptochloris species. The walls of all the other phycobionts, including Myrmecia and Pseudochlorella, were totally degraded, showing that a trilaminar wall layer is not conclusive evidence for the presence of a resistant cell wall polymer. The infrared absorption spectra of the degradation-resistant cell wall polymer of Coccomyxa and Elliptochloris species were not fully identical with those of natural sporopollenins. When the widely used, but chemically less appropriate acetolysis method was applied to either entire cells or isolated but not fully extracted cell walls of Coccomyxa, Elliptochloris, Myrmecia, Pseudochlorella, Trebouxia, and Trentepohlia species, they all yielded acetolysis-resistant residues whose infrared spectra resembled natural sporopollenin.