The Control of Cell Division in the Root Meristem

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Understanding the development of organisms entails understanding how cell division is controlled. While a great deal has been learned about the regulation of the cell cycle, much less is known about how a developing organism controls the rate and location of cell division activity. This project aims to deepen our knowledge of how a growing plant organ controls the spatial distribution of cell division, by using as a model the root meristem of Arabidopsis thaliana. The project will test hypotheses about the regulation of cell division, specifically addressing how cells decide to stop dividing. Do cells stop dividing when they start expanding too rapidly or when their volume becomes too great? Although this project uses plants as experimental material, much of what is known about how cell division is controlled in plants appears to be true also for animals. When animal cells fail to stop dividing, the result can be cancer; thus the findings from this project may apply not only to optimizing plant growth for agriculture but might ultimately apply to minimizing the threat of cancer.