ISSN print edition: 0366-6352 ISSN electronic edition: 1336-9075 Registr. No.: MK SR 9/7 Published monthly

Application of positron emission tomography and 2-[¹⁸F]fluoro-2-deoxy-D-glucose for visualization and quantification of solute transport in plant tissues

Denisa Partelová, Jozef Uhrovčík, Juraj Lesný, Miroslav Horník, Pavol Rajec, Peter Kováč, and Stanislav Hostin

Department of Ecochemistry and Radioecology, University of SS. Cyril and Methodius in Trnava, Nám. J. Herdu 2, Trnava, SK, 917 01, Slovakia

E-mail: lesny@ucm.sk

Abstract: The aim of the presented work was to evaluate the uptake and distribution of 2-fluoro-2-deoxy-D-glucose spiked with ¹⁸F (2-[¹⁸F]FDG) in tissues of tobacco plants (Nicotiana tabacum L.) by positron emission tomography and multivariate data analysis after the immersion of the petiole of excised leaf or root of a tobacco plant in a glucose solution. From individual experiments it was found that increasing glucose concentration (c _glu) in the applied solution resulted in significantly higher 2-[¹⁸F]FDG diffusion and translocation within the leaf parenchyma. More than a four times increase of the 2-[¹⁸F]FDG translocation into the aboveground parts of the tobacco plant in case of the root immersion in solution with 100-times higher c _glu in comparison with the control (c _glu = 0.00762 mg cm⁻³) was determined. These facts were not confirmed only visually on basis of the obtained 3D images, but also by the increasing coincidence transfer factor (TF_c) values defined by the ratio of the number of analyzed coincidences in the non-immersed parts of leaf or plant to coincidences in leaf petiole or root immersed in the solution. Cluster and principal component analysis suggest that the 2-[¹⁸F]FDG uptake by the petiole of excised leaf and root system was realized by different mechanisms; also, the 3D image quality is influenced by the initial radioactivity of the applied solution.

Keywords: 2-[18F]FDG – positron emission tomography – visualization – plant tissues – glucose – multivariate analysis

Full paper is available at www.springerlink.com.

DOI: 10.2478/s11696-014-0609-8

Chemical Papers 68 (11) 1463–1473 (2014)