Regeneration of the root pole in surgically transected carrot embryos occurs by position-dependent, proximodistal replacement of missing tissues.

Torpedo-stage carrot embryos were surgically transected at various locations along the shoot-root axis and explants of the cotyledon-bearing shoot pole were sectioned and examined in order to provide a more detailed description of root pole regeneration. When excisions occurred at the sites of the future hypocotyl, the future radicle or the future root apical meristem, the regenerating axial tissues exhibited patterns of cellular organization that were nearly identical to those seen in unsevered controls. To accomplish this restoration, new cells, of the type normally found at each cutting site, were produced behind a regeneration dome that formed over the original surgical site. The regeneration dome was displaced by division and expansion-driven extension of the longitudinal axis, and cells in the renewed region quickly acquired individual anatomical traits and collective tissue morphologies that corresponded to those of cells in the analogous locations in intact embryos. Although no clear mechanism is implied, the results of these experiments suggest that interactions between cells near the surgical margin permit them to retain their sense of location within the original structure, and apprise them of the removal of their basipetally positioned neighbors. With varying-length remnants of the shoot serving as the only vestige of the original size and shape of the embryo, cells close to the site of excision were apparently reconfigured to commence ordered divisions that ultimately reconstituted the embryonic axis.