How plants build their cell walls is seen by scientists for the first time ever

In a major scientific milestone, a team of researchers has captured the first continuous, real-time footage of cellulose being synthesized and self-assembled into the intricate scaffolding that gives plant cells their structure. 

Using advanced microscopy techniques and a custom-built imaging system, the team recorded 24 hours of this cellular construction process in living plant cells, revealing surprising new details about how plant cell walls are built.

The study, led by Rutgers University–New Brunswick, provides an unprecedented look into the behavior of cellulose – the most abundant biopolymer on Earth.

The research also offers insights that could lead to stronger, more resilient crops, cheaper biofuels, biodegradable plastics, and other sustainable products.

Closer look at plant cells

Cellulose is a key component of plant cell walls and plays a vital role in maintaining plant structure. It’s also a valuable resource used in countless everyday products, from paper and clothing to food thickeners and filtration materials.

Sang-Hyuk Lee is an associate professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at Rutgers and a co-author of the study. 

“This work is the first direct visualization of how cellulose synthesizes and self-assembles into a dense fibril network on a plant cell surface, since Robert Hook’s first microscopic observation of cell walls in 1667,” said Lee.

“This study also provides entirely new insights into how simple, basic physical mechanisms such as diffusion and self-organization may lead to the formation of complex cellulose networks in cells.”

The videos produced by Lee’s team show protoplasts – plant cells with their outer walls removed – from Arabidopsis, a relative of cabbage, as they spontaneously begin forming cellulose filaments.

These filaments grow outward from the cell surface in seemingly chaotic patterns, gradually coalescing into the highly organized structure of a new cell wall.

“I was very surprised by the emergence of ordered structures out of the chaotic dance of molecules when I first saw these video images,” Lee said. “I thought plant cellulose would be made in a lot more of an organized fashion, as depicted in classical biology textbooks.”

A team effort across disciplines

The breakthrough is the result of more than six years of collaboration between three Rutgers laboratories representing physics, engineering, and plant biology. Each group played a vital role in bringing the project to life.

When standard laboratory microscopes proved too limited to observe the fine detail of cellulose formation, Lee developed a specialized system based on total internal reflection fluorescence microscopy.

This method allowed the researchers to image the cell’s underside with high resolution over long periods without damaging the samples.

Meanwhile, Shishir Chundawat, an associate professor in the Department of Chemical and Biochemical Engineering at Rutgers, led the development of a fluorescent probe system that tagged cellulose molecules so they could be visualized under the microscope.

How to watch plants build cell walls

His team used a modified bacterial enzyme that binds specifically to cellulose to create the tagging system.

“I have always been fascinated by plants and how they capture sunlight via leaves into reduced carbon forms like cellulose that form cell walls,” said Chundawat, who is also focused on biofuel and bioproduct development.

“I was inspired by collecting leaves as a middle school student. That early curiosity led me to delve deeper into biomass and its potential to create valuable, sustainable products.”

Eric Lam, a professor in the Department of Plant Biology, and his team developed the protocol to isolate protoplasts – cells stripped of their original walls.

This provided a clean slate on which new cellulose fibers could be tracked as they formed in real time.

“This provided little to no background cellulose to confound our visualization and tracking of newly synthesized cellulose under optimized conditions,” Lam explained.

Implications for agriculture and biofuels

The new findings are expected to inform future genetic and biotechnological efforts to enhance cellulose production in crops – improving traits like drought resistance, carbon capture, and the efficiency of biomass conversion to fuel.

“This discovery opens the door for researchers to begin dissecting the genes that could play various roles for cellulose biosynthesis in the plant,” Lam said. 

“The knowledge gained from these future studies will provide new clues for approaches to design better plants for carbon capture, improve tolerance to all kinds of environmental stresses, from drought to disease, and optimize second-generation cellulosic biofuels production.”

A new chapter in plant biology

The Rutgers team’s work challenges the traditional textbook narrative of orderly cellulose assembly, showing that what appears initially as disordered movement eventually organizes into the essential structure of the cell wall.

This finding adds complexity to our understanding of plant biology and could inspire future scientists to take a closer look – literally and figuratively – at the hidden processes that sustain life on Earth.

Animations aimed at young students often simplify how plant cell walls are made, but the Rutgers team’s research reveals that the real process is far more intricate – and far more beautiful.

The study is published in the journal Science Advances.

Image Credit: Ehsan Faridi/ Inmywork Studio/ Chundawat, Lee and Lam Labs

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