Question

Where in plant cells do lysosomal activities occur?

Answer 1

Hint: The lysosomes are the organelles that are concerned with the storage and digestion of digesting carbohydrates, proteins, lipids and nucleic acids. These organelles contain hydrolytic enzymes that serve these functions.
Now, the lysosomes are only found in animal cells. They are absent in plant cells. So, other organelles perform the functions of lysosomes in plant cells. Now let us learn about the organelles in plant cells that perform this particular task.

Complete answer:
In the plant cells, the function of lysosomes is performed mainly by the spherosomes.
As discussed above, the major function of lysosomes is:
1. Removal of waste materials
2. Digestion of food particles
The spherosomes particularly serve these two functions in a plant cell. They are mainly concerned with the storage and digestion of fats. Thus, they ‘mimic’ the function of lysosomes in a plant cell. The fats are digested with the help of hydrolytic enzymes present within the spherosomes.

Note:
This particular question is in fact a matter of debate among the biologists. Some of the learned men believe that the vacuoles also perform the function of lysosomes in plant cells as they help in removal of waste products from the cell, while another group disregards it since vacuoles do not contain any digestive enzymes. Yet another group considers both the organelles- spherosomes and vacuoles together for their lysosomal activities. Recently the scientists have proposed to include yet another substance present in the cytosol, the aleurone grains, present in plant cells in the category of plant lysosomes, along with the most vacuolar components in the plant cells.