Preparation of proteins from different organs of Japanese morning glory by an in vivo electro‐elution procedure

Abstract

An electro-elution procedure has been employed efficiently to collect proteins from stem segments, young leaves and roots of the Japanese morning glory. Electrophoretic conditions were optimised, including the size of segments (10-30 mm), the strength of the current for electro-elution (2.5-10 mA), and the exposure time of electro-elution (2-12 h). From the same quantity of organs, the in vivo electro-elution procedure permitted the collection of an amount of protein up to six times greater than that obtained with an earlier-reported centrifugation procedure. Both preparations were analysed by SDS-PAGE and showed similar protein profiles. This new technique provided an interesting insight into the large differences in both the quality and quantity of proteins between different organs of the plants. The average amount of protein collected from organs was 0.1 mg/g of tissue fresh weight. It is expected that this procedure may facilitate the discovery of new proteins with unique functions in extracellular matrices involved in the response of plants to various external stimuli.