Plant physiology

If you put a cutting of, say, a geranium or an inchplant, into a cup of water, you can see tender new roots reaching out within a few days. Soon, a tiny new leaf pokes out of the stem. What you’re seeing is the result of cell division – without which, nothing grows.

For the first time, a biophysical model has been created to describe an essential, life-giving process among plants: cell division through the building of a wall that divides the original cell into two daughter cells, called cytokinesis.