We compared isozyme patterns of glutamate (GDH), alcohol (ADH), and succinate (SDH) dehydrogenases and aspartate-aminotransferase (GOT) in scutella of seedlings of Zea mays L., Zea mexicana Mangelsdorfii (Balsas race from Guerrero, Mexico) and a tetraploid (2n = 72) form of Tripsacum dactyloides L; seeds were obtained from Krasnodar Agricultural Research Institute.
GDH, ADH, SDH and GOT spectra of teosinte corresponded to the phenotypic classes most frequent in maize. SDH and ADH spectra of Tripsacum were the same as in teosinte and most maize inbreds (62% and > 90% for SDH and ADH, respectively). A new class (D) of GDH spectra (cf. Fig. 1 of previous note), absent in maize and teosinte, was found in Tripsacum. The slow glyoxysomal GOT isozyme characteristic of Tripsacum was present in maize with a frequency of 1/6 and was absent in teosinte.
Our data are in line with observations by J. G. Waines (cf. Galinat, Annual Rev. Genet. 5:447, 1971) that reserve protein patterns are similar in maize and teosinte and distinct in Tripsacum. Both groups of data can be interpreted in two ways:
In our opinion, however, cytological, genetical and biochemical evidence on Maydeae taken as a whole seems to support the second assumption.
L. E. Monastyreva, T. B. Sukhorgevskaya, E. E. Khavkin and V. S. Scherbak*
*Krasnodar Agricultural Research Institute
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