The Orphan Crop Crassocephalum crepidioides Accumulates the Pyrrolizidine Alkaloid Jacobine in Response to Nitrogen Starvation.

ABSTRACT: Crassocephalum crepidioides is an African orphan crop that is used as a leafy vegetable and medicinal plant. Although it is of high regional importance in Sub-Saharan Africa, the plant is still mainly collected from the wild and therefore efforts are made to promote its domestication. However, in addition to beneficial properties, there was first evidence that C. crepidioides can accumulate the highly toxic pyrrolizidine alkaloid (PA) jacobine and here it was investigated, how jacobine production is controlled. Using ecotypes from Africa and Asia that were characterized in terms of their PA profiles, it is shown that the tetraploid C. crepidioides forms jacobine, an ability that its diploid close relative Crassocephalum rubens appears to lack. Evidence is provid

SUBMITTER: Schramm S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8355542 | biostudies-literature | 2021

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature