A muscle contracting substance from a plant's closing Fly-Trap

✍ Scribed by H. W. Lea

• Book ID: 104752274
• Publisher: Springer-Verlag
• Year: 1976
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 277 KB
• Volume: 129
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0032-0935
• DOI: 10.1007/bf00390911

✦ Synopsis

A muscle contracting substance (MCS) occurs in crushed, incubated traps of the insectivorous plant, the Venus Fly-Trap (Dionaea muscipula Ellis). This MCS is provisionally identified as lysophosphatidic acid. More MCS is produced from traps which have been touched than from untouched traps, which may be due to activation of phospholipase D. This enzyme hydrolyses phospholipids of membranes, and could alter the physiological properties of membranes.