Regulation of Plant Morphogenesis: Generation of Anisotropy at Cellular and Tissue Levels

Abstract

Plant morphogenesis fundamentally relies on unequal or ‘anisotropic’ growth to generate variation in form. The mechanisms that regulate the production of specific organ shapes are many and varied, and interact with one another, resulting in a complex regulatory network. This complexity of regulation may contribute to the robustness of plant morphogenesis, and also allows the integration of environmental inputs with endogenous signals. Here we examine a range of mechanisms that regulate plant development, focussing first on processes that occur at the level of the cell, then considering how the activities of many cells are coordinated across tissues to produce organs and organisms.