Induction of apoptosis in purified animal and plant nuclei by Xenopus egg extracts

We have developed a cell-free system that can trigger the nuclei purified from mouse liver and suspension-cultured carrot cells to undergo apoptosis as defined by the formation of apoptotic bodies and nucleosomal DNA fragments. The effects of different divalent cations and cycloheximide on DNA cleavage in this system were assessed. The fact that nuclei of plant cells can be induced to undergo apoptosis in a cell-free animal system suggests that animals and plants share a common signal transduction pathway triggering in the initiation stage of apoptosis.