Analyzing the complex machinery of cell wall biosynthesis

Abstract

The plant cell wall polymers make up most of the plant biomass and provide the raw material for many economically important products including food, feed, bio-materials, chemicals, textiles, and biofuel. This broad range of functions and applications make the biosynthesis of these polysaccharides a highly interesting target of scientific research. In this thesis a protein-protein interaction strategy was used to gain insight in the cell wall biosynthesis of Arabidopsis thaliana and to identify additional genes involved in this process. Using the membrane based yeast two hybrid system several distinct goals have been reached in this thesis, i) the characterization of the rosette structure by resolving the organization of the different cellulose synthase proteins in the complex, ii) the identification of unknown components of the cellulose synthezing machinery, iii) the confirmation of a xyloglucan synthesizing complex and the identification of several of its components. On the whole, this work has generated an effective tool in cell wall research and identified new players in the biosynthesis of both cellulose and xyloglucan. <br/