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From tissue mechanics to plant morphogenesis
The form of organisms relies on the mechanical properties of their cells and tissues. In order to help understanding how plants grow and reach well-defined shapes, we developed a set of experimental and theoretical approaches to quantify tissue mechanics in living plants at multiple scales and to relate such measurements to morphogenesis. We notably found that plant stem cells are stiffer than surrounding cells and that each cell is inflated by an internal pressure that depends on cell topology. During the talk, I will briefly introduce the required biological concepts for a general audience and I will focus on the mechanical basis of our approaches and results.