Denley Bowers, Rachel (2018) The Economics of Stomatal Development. PhD thesis, University of Sheffield.
Abstract
Development is the result of a series of division, expansion and differentiation events, and the relationship between these events drives characteristics such as organ size and shape, patterning of tissues, and placement of specialised cells. Varying the rates of division, expansion and differentiation allows for plasticity in development. This plasticity means that there are often several routes to the same developmental outcome: for example, increasing cell division will increase the distance between specialised cells or increase organ size, and so will increasing cell expansion. Hence, a question arises: why do plants maintain a certain size or cell placement through a specific route, such as increasing cell expansion? The reason for this could be that one route is more energetically favourable than another, and so a calculation of economy is responsible for certain developmental decisions.
Stomata are pores on the surface of the leaf which, in their opening and closing, regulate gas exchange and the movement of water vapour between the interior of the leaf and its environment. Stomatal development is a plastic developmental process which is governed by a series of specific cell division and differentiation events, and therefore provides a suitable model for exploring the relationship between changes in plastic developmental processes and energetic cost to the plant.
The work described in this thesis uses a combination of experimental and theoretical methods to further understand the range of cell division, expansion and differentiation events which result in the spacing of stomata within the abaxial epidermis of the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana and the economic costs of those processes, to develop an understanding of the economics of stomatal development.
Metadata
Supervisors: | Casson, Stuart and Monk, Nick |
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Awarding institution: | University of Sheffield |
Academic Units: | The University of Sheffield > Faculty of Science (Sheffield) > Molecular Biology and Biotechnology (Sheffield) |
Identification Number/EthosID: | uk.bl.ethos.767269 |
Depositing User: | Miss Rachel Denley Bowers |
Date Deposited: | 25 Feb 2019 09:02 |
Last Modified: | 25 Sep 2019 20:06 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:etheses.whiterose.ac.uk:22920 |
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