Chlorination of lignin by ubiquitous fungi has a likely role in global organochlorine production.

ABSTRACT: Soils and decayed plant litter contain significant quantities of chlorinated aromatic polymers that have a natural but largely unknown origin. We used cupric oxide ligninolysis coupled with gas chromatography/mass spectrometry to show that Curvularia inaequalis, a widely distributed litter ascomycete, chlorinated the aromatic rings of lignin in wood that it was degrading. In aspen wood decayed for 24 weeks, two chlorolignin fragments, 5-chlorovanillin and 2-chlorosyringaldehyde, were each found at approximately 10 mug/g of wood (dry weight). These levels resemble those of similar structures generally found in unpolluted environmental samples. Fractionation of the extractable proteins followed by tandem mass spectrometric analysis showed that the colonized wood contained a previously descri

SUBMITTER: Ortiz-Bermudez P 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC1820680 | biostudies-literature | 2007 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature