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Title: Suppression of CINNAMOYL-CoA REDUCTASE increases the level of monolignol ferulates incorporated into maize lignins

Journal Article · · Biotechnology for Biofuels
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Background.The cell wall polymer lignin provides structural support and rigidity to plant cell walls, and therefore to the plant body. However, the recalcitrance associated with lignin impedes the extraction of polysaccharides from the cell wall to make plant-based biofuels and biomaterials. The cell wall digestibility can be improved by introducing labile ester bonds into the lignin backbone that can be easily broken under mild base treatment at room temperature. The FERULOYL-CoA MONOLIGNOL TRANSFERASE (FMT) enzyme, which may be naturally found in many plants, uses feruloyl-CoA and monolignols to synthesize the ester-linked monolignol ferulate conjugates. A mutation in the first lignin-specific biosynthetic enzyme, CINNAMOYL-CoA REDUCTASE (CCR), results in an increase in the intracellular pool of feruloyl-CoA. Results. Maize (Zea mays) has a native putative FMT enzyme, and its ccr mutants produce an increased pool of feruloyl-CoA that can be used for conversion to monolignol ferulate conjugates. The decreased lignin content and monomers did not, however, impact the plant growth or biomass. The increase in monolignol conjugates correlated with an improvement in the digestibility of maize stem rind tissue. Conclusions. Together, increased monolignol ferulates and improved digestibility in ccr1 mutant plants suggests that they may be superior biofuel crops.

Research Organization:
Univ. of Wisconsin, Madison, WI (United States). Wisconsin Energy Institute
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE
Grant/Contract Number:
BER DE-FC02-07ER64494; FC02-07ER64494
OSTI ID:
1618676
Alternate ID(s):
OSTI ID: 1393539
Journal Information:
Biotechnology for Biofuels, Journal Name: Biotechnology for Biofuels Vol. 10 Journal Issue: 1; ISSN 1754-6834
Publisher:
Springer Science + Business MediaCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
Netherlands
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 28 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

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Cited By (2)

The lignin toolbox of the model grass Setaria viridis journal June 2019
Reductive Cleavage Method for Quantitation of Monolignols and Low-Abundance Monolignol Conjugates journal May 2018

Linked Research (4)

Figures / Tables (7)

Figure 1(p. 3)figure Figure 1
Figure 2(p. 4)figure Figure 2
Table 1(p. 5)table Table 1
Table 2(p. 5)table Table 2
Figure 3(p. 6)figure Figure 3
Figure 4(p. 7)figure Figure 4
Table 3(p. 7)table Table 3

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Related Subjects

09 BIOMASS FUELS
Zea mays
Mass spectrometry
Cell wall digestibility
Biofuels