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Plant and Cell Physiology Advance Access published online on December 17, 2007
Plant and Cell Physiology, doi:10.1093/pcp/pcm173
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© The Author 2007. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Japanese Society of Plant Physiologists. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Differences in the metabolite profiles of spinach (Spinacia oleracea L.) leaf in different concentrations of nitrate in the culture solution

Keiki Okazaki1, Norikuni Oka1, Takuro Shinano2, Mitsuru Osaki3 and Masako Takebe1

1National Agricultural Research Center for Hokkaido Region, Sapporo 062-8555, Japan
2Creative Research Initiative "Sousei" (CRIS), Hokkaido University, Sapporo 001-0021, Japan
3Graduate School of Agriculture, Hokkaido University, Sapporo 060-8589, Japan

Corresponding author: Dr. Takuro Shinano. e-mail: takuro{at}chem.agr.hokudai.ac.jp, Tel & Fax: 011-706-9210, Creative Research Initiative "Sousei" (CRIS), Hokkaido University, N21 W10, Kitaku, Sapporo


  Abstract

The nitrogen (N) status of a plant determines the composition of its major components (amino acids, proteins, carbohydrates, and organic acids) and, directly or indirectly, affects the quality of agricultural products in terms of their calorific value and taste. Although these effects are guided by changes in metabolic pathways, no overall metabolic analysis has previously been conducted to demonstrate such effects. Here, metabolite profiling using gas chromatography mass spectrometry (GC-MS) was used to evaluate the effect of N levels on spinach tissue, comparing two cultivars that differed in their ability to use N. Wide variation in N content was observed without any distinct inhibition of growth in either cultivar. Principal component analysis (PCA) and self-organizing mapping (SOM) were undertaken to describe changes in the metabolites of mature spinach leaves. In PCA, the first component accounted for 44.5% of the total variance, which was positively correlated with the plant's N content, and a close relationship between metabolite profiles and N status was observed. Both PCA and SOM revealed that metabolites could be broadly divided into two types, correlating either positively or negatively with plant N content. The simple and co-coordinated metabolic stream, containing both general and spinach-specific aspects of plant N content, will be useful in future research on such topics as the detection of environmental effects on spinach through comprehensive metabolite profiling.

Keywords: GC-MS - Metabolome - Nitrogen - Spinacia oleracea

(Received November 14, 2007; Accepted December 6, 2007)
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