Issues

Summary: In this Editorial, Ottoline Leyser introduces this Special Issue focusing on plant developmental biology, which is published in honour of Ian Sussex – a founding father of the field.

Summary: This Spotlight article looks back at the research career of Ian Sussex, who helped transform the discipline of plant developmental biology into the dynamic, sophisticated field that it is today.

Summary: This poster article provides an overview of the auxin signal transduction pathway, highlighting how it facilitates rapid switching between transcriptional repression and gene activation.

Summary: This Review revisits Ian Sussex's early studies of leaf dorsiventrality and describes our current understanding of the mechanisms that establish and maintain adaxial-abaxial leaf polarity.

Summary: This Review discusses how CLV-WUS signaling coordinates stem cell proliferation with differentiation, highlighting commonalities and differences between CLV-WUS pathways in different species.

Summary: This Review explores the relationship between tension and cell adhesion in the plant epidermis, identifying parallels between plant epidermal and animal epithelial tissues.

Summary: This Review discusses recent evidence supporting the floral quartet model and suggests a novel hypothesis that explains how floral quartet-like complexes may interact with chromatin.

Summary: This Review examines the genetic and cellular basis of helical growth in plants, providing an overview of the various types of helical growth as well as their adaptive significance.

Summary: This Review discusses how developmental features, such as plant architecture, leaf features and vasculature architecture, are regulated and how they might be manipulated to improve crop yield.

Summary: Arabidopsis endosperm turgor pressure can be calculated from whole-seed indentation measurements, is elevated during seed expansion and decreases at the onset of cellularisation.

Summary: Elimination of the Arabidopsis endosperm during seed development involves a developmental programmed cell death process requiring cell wall modifications and mechanical stresses imposed by embryo growth.

Summary: The genetic module controlling patterning of stomata in vascular plants also functions in non-vascular plants, consistent with the idea that it represents an ancestral mechanism in plant evolution.

Summary: The expression of TFL1, a key inflorescence architecture regulator, is composite and involves distinct cis-regulatory elements, thereby allowing TFL1 to regulate different aspects of plant development.

Summary: Reactive oxygen species promote cell wall remodeling of cells overlying the sites of lateral root formation, thereby contributing to lateral root emergence in Arabidopsis.

Summary: The transcription factor LBD29 regulates induction of the auxin transporter LAX3 during lateral root emergence in order to fine-tune its temporal expression pattern and cell separation.

Summary: During halotropism, root tip architecture allows for a decrease in PIN2 at the salt-exposed side of the root, resulting in re-routing of auxin to the opposite side; feedback on AUX1 amplifies this auxin asymmetry.

Summary: Live imaging reveals that the de novo establishment of organizing center cells in Arabidopsis lateral root primordia is dependent on SCARECROW expression and coincides with a developmental phase transition.

Summary: The MADS-box transcription factor STK controls seed abscission in Arabidopsis, while the excess or absence of lignin deposition in the abscission zone restricts seed detachment.

Summary: During plastid stress-induced apical callus production in Arabidopsis, the cytokinin/WUSCHEL pathway and a plastid-to-nucleus signaling pathway are implicated in cell differentiation at the shoot apex.

Summary: The diversity of fruit shape in the Brassicaceae family is based on local variation of directional growth that alters during developmental phases.

Summary: The juvenile-adult phase change in rice is regulated by the PRECOCIOUS gene, which encodes an enzyme involved in jasmonate biosynthesis and hence regulates jasmonate levels.

Summary: A novel strategy for the analysis of complex biological 2D shapes is presented and used to analyse the architecture and developmental trajectory of different Arabidopsis leaves.