ИСТИНА

Humans are well known to extensively use natural resources for their practical purposes. Now industry consumes tremendous amount of minerals. Metals, including heavy metals are an essential part of minerals and indispensable in many fields in production, at the same time being a source of waste and environment pollution. Plants are the part of most ecosystems, capable to produce organic compounds by using the atmospheric CO2 as a source of carbon. Plants absorb metals with nutrients by roots. Metals further are accumulated, decreasing efficiency of metabolic processes and photosynthesis. This, unfortunately, causes harm to ecosystem and environment generally. Therefore, we decided to measure the effect of metals on the formation of reactive oxygen spices (ROS) and photosynthesis in plant cells. Goal is to study the effect of copper ions on photosynthesis and rate of reactive oxygen species (ROS) formation in cells of Pisum sativum leaves. Tasks are to study the effect on CuSO4 on the rate of ROS formation in the epidermis from pea leaves, using the ROS-sensitive dye diacetate 2,7-dichlorofluorescin (DCFH-DA) and to study the effect of CuSO4 on the photosynthetic production of O2 by carvings of the pea leaves polarographycally. The results show that CuSO4 has a prooxidant property accelerating the formation of ROS as determined by DCF fluorescence. The enhancing effect was increasing up to concentration of 1 mM and then declined up to concentration of 10 mM. CuSO4 can also function as a weak electron acceptor in FSII (up to QA). Data obtained allow to reach more presses understanding of the mechanisms of toxic action of copper on photosynthetic organisms and make another tiny step to addressing global environmental challenge