Abstract
Meristems in aerial parts of plants (shoot apical meristems and axillary meristems) are indeterminate structures and the sources of stem cells from which all post-embryonic aerial organs are derived. The regulatory network which functions within the meristems to control their activity has been well studied, while some reports suggested that the signals for the meristem regulation are provided also from outside of the meristems. However, the molecular mechanisms which are involved in the regulation of such signals are largely unknown. We previously isolated the Arabidopsis uni-1D mutant harboring a semi-dominant and gain-of-function allele of the UNI gene, a CC-NB-LRR member, and interestingly uni-1D plants show morphological phenotypes; a defect of meristem maintenance and ectopic formation of axillary meristems. During analysis of this mutant, we noticed that ERECTA family function outside the meristems affects their activities both in uni-1D mutant background and in wild-type background.
