Sago Palm (Metroxylon sagu): Most Promising Starch-producing Crop: Characters of Sago Palm Starch and its Accumulation

Abstract

In order to achieve higher and/or sustainable production and supply for customers, to identify and quantify of starch accumulation feature is necessary. In sago palm (Metroxylon sagu), there are a lot of cultivars culturing and/or growing in different environmental conditions. The objective of this research is to characterize the morphological feature of sago palm starch. Amyloplast is formed near the apical portion. Its separation/division occurred abundantly and specifically in the apical portion as well as in the basal stem, middle or late growth stage. Significant difference is observed in the size of amyloplast among varieties. Number of amyloplast in cross sectional area of parenchyma tissue is also different among varieties. Starch grain size of sago palm is located in a middle among 54 plant species examined. These results suggest that the separation/division and shape of amyloplast is so specific, while the size ofstarch grain is located in a middle. Starch is only product of higher plants. There are a lot of kinds of plants which produce starch. Among of them, some plants produce starch in seed [grain), root, and stem. In case of rice plant, starch accumulation is mainly in grain, however, accumulation feature and/or quality is so divers in different cultivars, culturing methods, environmental conditions and grain position within a panicle. Therefore, to identify and quantify ofstarch accumulation feature are of interest for higher and/or sustainable production and supply for customers. In sago palm, there are many cultivars culturing and/or growing in different environmental conditions. So, starch accumulation features appear to be different among sago palms. The objective of this research is to characterize the morphological feature of sago palm starch using sago palm stem of our previous report (references).