A lateral shoot, commonly known as a

branch A branch, sometimes called a ramus in botany, is a woody structural member connected to the central trunk of a tree (or sometimes a shrub). Large branches are known as boughs and small branches are known as twigs. The term '' twig'' usuall ...

, is a part of a plant's

shoot In botany, a plant shoot consists of any plant stem together with its appendages, leaves and lateral buds, flowering stems, and flower buds. The new growth from seed germination that grows upward is a shoot where leaves will develop. In the sp ...

system that develops from

axillary bud The axillary bud (or lateral bud) is an embryonic or organogenic shoot located in the axil of a leaf. Each bud has the potential to form shoots, and may be specialized in producing either vegetative shoots (stems and branches) or reproductive ...

s on the stem's surface, extending laterally from the plant's stem.

Importance to photosynthesis

As a plant grows it requires more energy, it also is required to out-compete nearby plants for this energy. One of the ways a plant can compete for this energy is to increase its height, another is to increase its overall surface area. That is to say, the more lateral shoots a plant develops, the more foliage the plant can support increases how much

photosynthesis Photosynthesis is a process used by plants and other organisms to convert light energy into chemical energy that, through cellular respiration, can later be released to fuel the organism's activities. Some of this chemical energy is stored in ...

the plant can perform as it allows for more area for the plant to uptake

carbon dioxide Carbon dioxide ( chemical formula ) is a chemical compound made up of molecules that each have one carbon atom covalently double bonded to two oxygen atoms. It is found in the gas state at room temperature. In the air, carbon dioxide is t ...

as well as sunlight.

Genes, transcription factors, and growth

Through testing with

Arabidopsis thaliana ''Arabidopsis thaliana'', the thale cress, mouse-ear cress or arabidopsis, is a small flowering plant native to Eurasia and Africa. ''A. thaliana'' is considered a weed; it is found along the shoulders of roads and in disturbed land. A winter ...

(A plant considered a

model organism A model organism (often shortened to model) is a non-human species that is extensively studied to understand particular biological phenomena, with the expectation that discoveries made in the model organism will provide insight into the workin ...

for plant genetic studies) genes including MAX1 and MAX2 have been found to affect growth of lateral shoots.

Gene knockout A gene knockout (abbreviation: KO) is a genetic technique in which one of an organism's genes is made inoperative ("knocked out" of the organism). However, KO can also refer to the gene that is knocked out or the organism that carries the gene kno ...

s of these genes cause abnormal proliferation of the plants affected, implying they are used for repressing said growth in

wild type The wild type (WT) is the phenotype of the typical form of a species as it occurs in nature. Originally, the wild type was conceptualized as a product of the standard "normal" allele at a locus, in contrast to that produced by a non-standard, "m ...

plants. Another set of experiments with Arabidopsis thaliana testing genes in the

plant hormone Plant hormone (or phytohormones) are signal molecules, produced within plants, that occur in extremely low concentrations. Plant hormones control all aspects of plant growth and development, from embryogenesis, the regulation of organ size, pat ...

florigen Florigen (or flowering hormone) is the hypothesized hormone-like molecule responsible for controlling and/or triggering flowering in plants. Florigen is produced in the leaves, and acts in the shoot apical meristem of buds and growing tips. It is kn ...

, two genes FT and TSF (which are abbreviations for Flowering Locus T, and Twin Sister of FT) when knocked out, appear to affect lateral shoot in a negative fashion. These

mutant In biology, and especially in genetics, a mutant is an organism or a new genetic character arising or resulting from an instance of mutation, which is generally an alteration of the DNA sequence of the genome or chromosome of an organism. It ...

s cause slower growth and improper formation of lateral shoots, which could also mean that lateral shoots are important to florigen's function. Along with general growth there are also

transcription factors In molecular biology, a transcription factor (TF) (or sequence-specific DNA-binding factor) is a protein that controls the rate of transcription of genetic information from DNA to messenger RNA, by binding to a specific DNA sequence. The fun ...

that directly effect the production of additional lateral shoots like the TCP family (also known as Teosinte branched 1/cycloidea/proliferating cell factor) which are plant specific proteins that suppress lateral shoot branching. Additionally the TCP family has been found to be partially responsible for inhibiting the cell's Growth hormone–releasing hormone (GHRF) which means it also inhibits cell proliferation.

References

Plant morphology Auxin action {{botany-stub

Importance to photosynthesis

Genes, transcription factors, and growth

See also

References