The Maize Leaf: Another Perspective on Growth Regulation

The Arabidopsis thaliana root tip has been a key experimental system to study organ growth regulation. It has clear advantages for genetic, transcriptomic, and cell biological studies that focus on the control of cell division and expansion along its longitudinal axis. However, the system shows some limitations for methods that currently require too much tissue to perform them at subzonal resolution, including quantification of proteins, enzyme activity, hormone, and metabolite levels and cell wall extensibility. By contrast, the larger size of the maize leaf does allow such analyses. Here we highlight exciting new possibilities to advance mechanistic understanding of plant growth regulation by using the maize leaf as a complimentary system to the Arabidopsis root tip.