Abstract
All plant cells synthesize and degrade starch in determined stage of their development. There are, however, important differences related to its use. In leaves, starch is produced and accumulated at day while it is degraded at night to provide carbon maintaining cellular processes. This means that the pathway regulation is integrated to the whole plant metabolism. Starch degradation is a process that depends on the starch granule structure, the action of several enzymes and the association of these to the starch granule. Recent research reveals that starch degradation in leaves is significantly different from starch endosperm breakdown and these new data have led to build a particular model of this pathway. Studies with mutants and transgenic plants suggest that β-amylase has a major role in the hydrolysis of the accumulated starch in leaves, while the participation of α-amylase is probably species-dependent. Additionally, in this paper is suggested that starch granule characteristics are especially important in regulating the starch interaction between granule and proteins involved in starch metabolism.
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