Inorganic
polyphosphates (
polyPs) are linear
polymers of
orthophosphate units linked by phosphoanhydride bonds.
Polyphosphates represent important stores of
phosphate and energy, and are abundant in many pro- and eukaryotic organisms. In plants, the existence of
polyPs has been established using microscopy and biochemical extraction methods that are now known to produce artifacts. Here we use a
polyP-specific
dye and a
polyP-binding domain to detect
polyPs in plant and algal cells. To develop the staining protocol, we induced
polyP granules in Nicotiana benthamiana and Arabidopsis cells by heterologous expression of Escherichia coli
polyphosphate kinase 1 (PPK1). Over-expression of PPK1 but not of a catalytically impaired version of the
enzyme leads to severe growth phenotypes, suggesting that
ATP-dependent synthesis and accumulation of
polyPs in the plant cytosol is toxic. We next crossed stable PPK1-expressing Arabidopsis lines with plants expressing the
polyP-binding domain of E. coli
exopolyphosphatase (PPX1c), which co-localized with PPK1-generated
polyP granules. These granules were stained by the
polyP-specific
dye JC-D7 and appeared as electron-dense structures in transmission electron microscopy sections. Using the
polyP staining protocol derived from these experiments, we screened for
polyP stores in different organs and tissues of both mono- and dicotyledonous plants. While we could not detect
polyP granules in higher plants, we could visualize the
polyP-rich acidocalcisomes in the green alga Chlamydomonas reinhardtii.