Abstract:

The secondary growth of trees determines timber production and has important economic value. In this review, we focus on a woody model plant, poplar, and a herbaceous model plant, Arabidopsis thaliana, and describe the signaling mechanism and gene regulation responsible for the vascular morphogenesis and functional organization. The main content is divided into several parts including vascular tissue function and formation, vascular cambium cell types and gene expression specificity, xylem and phloem key genes related to cell polarity, vascular cambium stem cell differentiation mechanisms, and the hormone regulatory networks in developing vascular tissues, with the emphasis on comparison of similarities and differences between the two species models.

Key words: vascular cambium, model systems, gene expression and regulation, polarity establishment, meristem cells, hormone regulatory network