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Bimodally oriented cellulose fibers and reticulated homogalacturonan networks - A direct visualization of Allium cepa primary cell walls

View ORCID ProfileWilliam J Nicolas, View ORCID ProfileFlorian Fäßler, Przemysław Dutka, View ORCID ProfileFlorian KM Schur, View ORCID ProfileGrant Jensen, View ORCID ProfileElliot Meyerowitz
doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2022.01.31.478342
William J Nicolas
1Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena California 91125
2Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Pasadena, California 91125
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Florian Fäßler
3Institute of Science and Technology (IST) Austria, Klosterneuburg, Austria
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Przemysław Dutka
1Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena California 91125
4Division of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena California 91125
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Florian KM Schur
3Institute of Science and Technology (IST) Austria, Klosterneuburg, Austria
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Grant Jensen
1Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena California 91125
5Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah 84604
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Elliot Meyerowitz
1Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena California 91125
2Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Pasadena, California 91125
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Abstract

One hallmark of plant cells is their pecto-cellulosic cell walls. They protect cells against the environment and high turgor and mediate morphogenesis through the dynamics of their mechanical and chemical properties. The walls are a complex polysaccharidic structure. Although their biochemical composition is well known, how the different components organize in the volume of the cell wall and interact with each other is not well understood and yet is key to the wall’s mechanical properties. To investigate the ultrastructure of the plant cell wall, we imaged the walls of onion (Allium cepa) bulbs in a near-native state via cryo-Focused Ion Beam milling (cryo-FIB-milling) and cryo-Electron Tomography (cryo-ET). This allowed the high-resolution visualization of cellulose fibers in situ (in muro). We reveal the coexistence of dense fiber fields bathed in a reticulated matrix we termed “meshing,” which is more abundant at the inner surface of the cell wall. The fibers adopted a regular bimodal angular distribution at all depths in the cell wall and bundled according to their orientation, creating layers within the cell wall. Concomitantly, employing homogalacturonan (HG)-specific enzymatic digestion, we observed changes in the meshing, suggesting that it is at least in part composed of HG pectins. We propose the following model for the construction of the abaxial epidermal primary cell wall: The cell deposits successive layers of cellulose fibers at −45° and +45° relative to the cell’s long axis and secretes the surrounding HG-rich meshing proximal to the plasma membrane, which then migrates to more distal regions of the cell wall.

Competing Interest Statement

The authors have declared no competing interest.

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The copyright holder for this preprint is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity. It is made available under a CC-BY-NC 4.0 International license.
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Posted February 01, 2022.
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Bimodally oriented cellulose fibers and reticulated homogalacturonan networks - A direct visualization of Allium cepa primary cell walls
William J Nicolas, Florian Fäßler, Przemysław Dutka, Florian KM Schur, Grant Jensen, Elliot Meyerowitz
bioRxiv 2022.01.31.478342; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2022.01.31.478342
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Bimodally oriented cellulose fibers and reticulated homogalacturonan networks - A direct visualization of Allium cepa primary cell walls
William J Nicolas, Florian Fäßler, Przemysław Dutka, Florian KM Schur, Grant Jensen, Elliot Meyerowitz
bioRxiv 2022.01.31.478342; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2022.01.31.478342

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