Vacuolar Compartments

Book excerpt: Research into plant vacuoles has, over the last 5 years, been injected with new data which have already radically changed our concept of the vacuolar compartment in plant cells. In fact, we should no longer speak of the vacuole, but rather of vacuolar compartments. This is a revolutionary change in the way in which the plant cell has traditionally been presented in the biological literature. Vacuolar Compartments is a timely volume that provides a broad overview of our current understanding of the roles of vacuolar compartments in plant cells. Chapters focus on individual function of plant vacuoles and the tonoplast machinery that supports them. Additional chapters present up-to-date information on the identity of different vacuole types and the traffic of proteins to them. The book also provides a basis for comparing the plant system to vacuoles in other organisms. The present challenge is to understand how the separate organelles in the system are generated and maintained by the cell, and to explain at a biochemical level the functions of each vacuole type and the mechanisms by which they are achieved. Vacuolar Compartments is the first book to provide this perspective.