Abstract
In higher plants, vacuoles increase their volume according to cell enlargement and become large vacuoles that occupy most of the cell volume. The large vacuole plays an essential role in cell elongation. However, little is known about the dynamics of vacuolar structures in the biogenesis of large vacuole. To observe the vacuolar dynamics in living cells, we have already established a transgenic BY-2 cell-line expressing a GFP-AtVam3p fusion protein (BY-GV), and have developed 3-D reconstruction software, named REANT.
In this study, we tried to clarify the morphological changes of vacuoles during the regeneration of large vacuoles in the BY-2 miniprotoplasts. The 3-D reconstruction and morphometrical analyses were performed using the BY-GV and REANT system. We found that the complicated network of vacuoles was developed during the regeneration of large vacuoles. Also, an increase of vacuolar surface area was occured before the increase of vacuolar volume.
