Anionic peroxidase from tomato (Lycopersicon esculentum) fruit oxidized indoleacetic acid (IAA) Peroxidase catalyzes a variety of reactions in vitro which may not have physiological functions in intact plants. One of these reactions is the oxidation of IAA in the presence of 02, Mn2+, and a monophenol (5,11,18,27 When tomatoes were extracted with water, two peroxidases were separated by gel filtration but only the larger enzyme oxidized IAA. Extraction of the same fruit with 0.2 M NaCl yielded the same peroxidases but both enzymes oxidized IAA. They observed that the effective peroxidases were optimally active at pH 6.1, or substantially higher than that for many other peroxidases (1 1, 24, 33). In the study of the effect of pH on the reaction, they used acetate buffer for the pH range of 4 to 6 and phosphate for higher pH. A possible explanation for the observed high pH optimum may be that the enzymes were more effective on IAA in phosphate than in acetate. Thomas and Jen (29) studied the oxidation of IAA by purified tomato peroxidase using phosphate buffer at pH 6. They confirmed that the enzyme was capable of oxidizing IAA in the presence of Mn2' and DCP,' and that peroxide was not required. During preliminary studies on the oxidation of IAA by tomato peroxidase, I observed that the rate of the reaction was dependent on the nature and concentration of the buffer. The reaction occurred very slowly in acetate at pH 3 to 6, but it proceeded rapidly when phosphate was included in the buffers. An examination of the reaction in other buffers led to the discovery that some anions have extraordinary effects on the oxidation of IAA by tomato peroxidase. The study was extended to oxidation of IAA by horseradish peroxidases and other porphyrin proteins.
MATERIALS AND METHODS
Purification of Tomato PeroxidaseOne kg of pericarp tissue from green tomato (Lycopersicon esculentum cv Sweet Chelsea) fruit was homogenized with 1 L of 0.2 M sodium acetate (pH 6.0), containing 1.0 M NaCl. The homogenate was stirred for 1 h at 3°C and centrifuged at 10,000g for 30 min. The supernatant solution was concentrated to 25 mL by ultrafiltration using a PM-10 membrane (Amicon Corp.) and dialyzed against 0.15 M NaCl. It was clarified by centrifugation and applied to a 5 x 40 cm column of Sephadex G-100 in 0. 15 M NaCl.