Cellular responses in successful fruit tree grafting

Closely related species will often form compatible grafts. But with some economic important cultivars a delayed incompatibility response leads to graft failure. Live cell analyses have shown that the intercellular communication through plasmodesmata is affected by the choice of graft partner.

 

In this project you will learn to operate the electron microscope and perform ultrastructural analyses of different tissues in grafted pear and apricot samples.