Abstract
Fourier Transform Infrared (FT-IR) microspectroscopy allows rapid analysis of the cell wall composition of areas of the tissue as small as one cell or a few cells. We analyzed the cell wall composition of root epidermis of the caprice, werewolf, glabra1, glabra2 (gl2), glabra3, transparent testa glabra1 mutants. The spectra (between 1800 and 900 cm-1) were interpreted by principal components analysis (PCA), a statistical method that reduced the dimensionality of the data. The spectra of gl2 root epidermis were separated from wild type spectra, although the rest of mutants that we analyzed were similar to wild type. PCA of these spectra suggests that the cell wall of root epidermis of gl2 contains more cellulose and less protein than that of wild type. These results indicate that GL2 regulate the cell wall synthesis in root epidermis as well as the differentiation of root-hair cell.
