Measuring the Deformation of Cells within a Piece of Compressed Potato Tuber Tissue

For the successful mathematical mechanical modelling of livingplant tissues, relationships between cellular deformations andtissue deformation need to be investigated. In previous workthese relationships have often been assumed. In this paper thedeformation of living cells within potato tuber tissue is measuredusing light microscopy and image analysis and is analysed inrelation to applied tissue deformations. The cell wall deformationwas found to depend upon the orientation of the cell wall faceswith respect to the global axes of the tissue and the appliedtissue deformation. Some faces experienced compression, whichreduced their surface area; others were deformed in bi-axialtension, thus increasing their surface area. These deformationswere successfully related to the global tissue deformations,using a simple constant volume affine deformation model, upto compressive deformations of 20% of specimen height. Somedeviation from the model was observed due to the bending ofcell walls in compression. Copyright 2000 Annals of Botany Company Potato tuber tissue, Solanum tuberosum, mechanical properties, cell walls, strain, re-orientation