Plastid DNA is not detectable in the male gametes and pollen tubes of an angiosperm (Antirrhinum majus) that is maternal for plastid inheritance

Abstract

Prior cytological observations using DAPI/epifluorescence microscopy have suggested that the method could be used to rapidly screen plant species for their potential mode of plastid DNA transmission. Cytoplasmic DAPI-DNA aggregates were observed in generative cells of germinated pollen of Medicago sativa (alfalfa), a species known genetically to display biparental transmission, but not in Antirrhinum majus (snapdragon), a species known to be maternal for plastid transmission. If, as suggested, these aggregates are plastid DNA nucleoids, then M. sativa pollen should contain plastid DNA detectable by molecular biology methods and A. majus pollen should not. Total DNA was isolated from germinated pollen and analyzed by Southern blot hybridization. A clone containing part of the rbcL gene from the garden pea plastome was used as a probe for plastid DNA. This probe hybridized with a restriction fragment from M. sativa pollen DNA, but not detectably with A. majus pollen DNA, thereby corroborating the identification of the cytoplasmic DAPI-DNA aggregates in M. sativa pollen as plastid DNA, and confirming the cytologically determined absence of plastic DNA in A. majus pollen.