How plants grow and develop
Unlike animals, plants are not mobile and are anchored into the soil. Similarly, plant cells are also immobile. While early development of animals is characterised by cell migration, plant cells are tightly connected to each other. As a consequence, the plant embryo mainly grows through strictly oriented cell divisions in three dimensions. At the same time these groups of cells need to acquire specific ‘identities’ that will eventually lead to the formation of for example wood or vascular tissues. Up to now, it was completely unclear how these two crucial processes of growth and pattern formation were controlled during tissue formation in a way that the tissue remains stable despite continuous cell divisions. The researchers discovered that pattern formation of the vascular tissues already takes place when the embryo only contains four vascular precursor cells.
The research group of the Laboratory of Biochemistry of Wageningen University could show that a genetic network controls the orientation of cell divisions during vascular tissue development of the plant.
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