Animals depend upon epithelial and endothelial tubes to transport gases and liquids in the body, and the sizes of the tubes are critical for their transport function. Tube size must be controlled not only during tube formation but throughout development in order to maintain functionality as the animal grows. For example, the human aorta expands approx. 100-fold between embryonic and adult life ...

The size of plant organs, such as leaves and flowers, is determined by an interaction of genotype and environmental influences. Organ growth occurs through the two successive processes of cell proliferation followed by cell expansion. A number of genes influencing either or both of these processes and thus contributing to the control of final organ size have been identified in the last decade. ...

................................................................................. 3 Acknowledgements ......................................................................... 4 Chapter

Acknowledgements My sincerest thank you to Dr. Magnus Egerstedt, whose teaching and mentorship has helped me grow tremendously as a student and a researcher. He agreed to mentor my undergraduate research with little incentive, and provided invaluable advice and lessons about more than just my research. It is largely because of him that I have decided to continue my education towards a PhD. I'd ...

Control mechanisms that regulate body size and tissue size have been sought at both the cellular and organismal level. Cell-level studies have revealed much about the control of cell growth and cell division, and how these processes are regulated by nutrition. Insulin signaling is the key mediator between nutrition and the growth of internal organs, such as imaginal disks, and is required for t...

During the past ten years, significant progress has been made in understanding the basic mechanisms of the development of multicellular organisms. Genetic analysis of the development of Caenorhabditis elegans and Drosophila has unearthed a fruitful number of genes involved in establishing the basic body plan, patterning of limbs, specification of cell fate and regulation of programmed cell deat...

Time-series hydrothermal syntheses from two organic-cation-free gels with different compositions were employed to study the factors that control the final size of zeolite L crystals. The first gel had a starting K/Al ratio of 10, whereas in the second one it was three times lower. The relatively simple chemical composition of the starting gels and the combination of complementary characterizati...

Seed size is a key determinant of evolutionary fitness, and is also one of the most important components of seed yield. In angiosperms, seed development begins with double fertilization, which leads to the formation of a diploid embryo and a triploid endosperm. The outermost layer of the seed is the seed coat, which differentiates from maternal integuments. Therefore, the size of a seed is dete...

Floral size is an ecologically important trait related to pollination success and genetic fitness. Independently of the sexual reproduction strategy, in many plants, floral size seems to be controlled by several genetic programs that are to some extent independent of vegetative growth. Flower size seems to be governed by at least two independent mechanisms, one controlling floral architecture t...