Isolation of intact vacuoles from Arabidopsis rosette leaf–derived protoplasts
Vacuoles are very prominent compartments within plant cells, and understanding of their function relies on knowledge of their content. Here, we present a simple vacuole purification protocol that was successfully used for large-scale isolation of vacuoles, free of significant contamination from other endomembrane compartments. This method is based on osmotic and thermal disruption of mesophyl-derived Arabidopsis protoplasts, followed by a density gradient fractionation of the cellular content. The whole procedure, including protoplast isolation, takes approximately 6 h.