On the metabolism of glucosamine-1-14C in detached tomato leaves

In the previous paper, occurrence of glucosamine in tomato plants fed with a high level of ammonium nitrogen has been reported(18). For the first time, SOLMS and HASSID(17) discovered glucosamine in tissues of higher plants. They isolated uridine diphosphate N-acetylglucosamine from mung bean seedlings. Thereafter, uridine diphosphate N-acetylglucosamine and N-acetylgalactosamine were chromatographically isolated from dahlia tubers(7). PUTZTAI(16) has succeeded in crystalyzing of glucosamine isolated from the seeds of higher plants and determined aminosugar contents in 14 kinds of, seeds. He considered aminosugars to be the normal constituents of plant seeds. LIS et al(11) have isolated glycopeptide containing mannosc, glucosamine, nnd aspartic acid from pure soy bean hemagllutin, and Kasai et al(10) have shown the presence of the glucosamine in hydrolyzatcs of glycoprotcins of broad bean and soy bean. Recently glucosaminc metabolism in mung bean 141.S been studied 02. 19). Although several workers have reported on glucosaminc in plants as mentioned above, the finding in the previous paper that the amount of glucosamine in tomato plants increased with concentration of ammonium nitrogen in water culture solution is quite unique.