How large is the carbon isotope fractionation of the photorespiratory enzyme glycine decarboxylase?
Guillaume Tcherkez Laboratoire d’Ecophysiologie Végétale, CNRS UMR 8079, Bâtiment 362, Université Paris XI, 91405 Orsay, France. Email: guillaume.tcherkez@ese.u-psud.fr Abstract Despite the intense effort developed over the past 10 years to determine the 12C / 13C isotope fractionation associated with photorespiration, much uncertainty remains about the amplitude, and even the sign, of the 12C / 13C isotope fractionation of glycine decarboxylase, the enzyme that produces CO2 during the photorespiratory cycle. In fact, leaf gas-exchange data have repeatedly indicated that CO2 evolved by photorespiration is depleted in 13C compared with the source material, while glycine decarboxylase has mostly favoured 13C in vitro. Here I give theoretical insights on the glycine decarboxylase reaction and show that (i), both photorespiration and glycine decarboxylation must favour the same carbon isotope — the in vitro measurements being probably adulterated by the high sensitivity of the enzyme to as
