Indicator Armeria maritima

A more complex extraction scheme than those of Hewitt, Bowen, and Reilly described above, was used to show that 65Zn is primarily associated with pectin in the root residue (Peterson, 1968). This was modified and used to indicate the association of copper in Armeria maritima (Mill) Willdenow (Farago et al., 1980) and Ni in Hybanthus floribundus (Farago and Mahmoud, 1983). The scheme is shown Fig. 10-1, and some typical results are shown in Table 10-1. In these last two investigations radiotracers were not required, since the plants accumulated Cu and Ni, respectively, and metal determinations were carried out by flame atomic absorption spectrometry on the individual fractions. 

Paper chromatography of an aqueous extract, after separation with Sephadex gel (G25), was used by Farago and Mullen (1979) in an investigation of soluble copper in aqueous extracts of copper-tolerant Armeria maritima. The roots of copper-tolerant A. maritima contain high concentrations of the amino acid proline and copper (Farago and Mullen, 1979, 1981) and the results indicated that water soluble copper (about 20%) was in combination with proline whereas the insoluble copper was associated with carbohydrates (Farago et al., 1980). 

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