Dual morphometric and microcellular spatial distribution analysis during zone-specific callogenesis in Fouquieria splendens

Plant growth, development, and physiology had a complex process across scales from molecular, cellular, tissue, and whole organism. Particularly, the plant in vitro studies have the attention on individual aspects of plant development. Mathematical and computational analysis are powerful tools that allow the integration of experimental data associated to in vitro mophogenesis of plants by image processing techniques. This work characterized the morphometric features of selected development zones of Fouquieria splendens callus by the analysis of scanning electron microscopy images and the spatial distribution of cells to describe the length and position of them on callogenesis process. Principal Component Analysis (PCA) successfully discriminated the developmental zones, accounting for 73.34% of the total explained variance and revealing that callogenesis is governed by discrete, predictable morphogenetic transitions with a coordinated and hyper-regular microcellular dispersion across all evaluated regions that effectively mitigate chaotic or disordered growth. Also, macrostructural descriptors showed homeostatic stabilizing agents that restore tissue density homogeneity. Finally, the fixed geometric canalization observed in roundness and aspect ratio parameters confirms that mechanical and structural stimuli strictly regulate cellular shape prior to massive volumetric cell expansion processes showing together the in vitro cellular mass development in this xerophytic species.