User:Mkbio1298/sandbox

Starch begins to pile up inside the leaves of plants during times of light when starch is able to be produced by photosynthetic processes. This ability to make starch disappears in the dark due to lack of illumination; there is insufficient amount of light produced during the dark needed to carry this reaction forward.Turning starch into sugar is done by the enzyme amylase.

Different Pathways of Amylase & location of Amylase Activity:
The process in which amylase breaks down starch is not consistent with all organisms that use amylase to breakdown stored starch. There are different amylose pathways that are involved in starch degradation. The occurrence of starch degradation into sugar by the enzyme amylase was most commonly known to take place in the chloroplast, but that has been proven wrong. One example is the spinach plant, in which the chloroplast contains both alpha and beta amylase ( different versions of amylase involved in the breakdown of starch; they differ in their substrate specificity). In spinach leaves the extrachloroplastic region contains the highest level of amylose degradation of starch. The difference between chloroplast and extrachloroplastic starch degradation is in the amylose they prefer; either in beta or alpha amylase. For spinach leaves, alpha- amylase is preferred but for plants/organisms like wheat, barely, peas, etc. the beta amylase is preferred.