Lateral growth patterns in the Cladoniaceae

Lateral growth from the apex of vertical structures is widespread in cladoniiform lichens. In the family Cladoniaceae, it is accomplished through a developmental shift in the meristem, in which growth orientation changes from isotropous to anisotropous. In anisotropous development, the more or less constant relationship among the axial, radial, and circumferential planes of growth is altered during ontogeny. The result is pronounced lateral elongation of the apical meristem, a departure from the isotropous body plan of early ontogeny. Development that favors radial and circumferential growth over axial growth is an innovation that provides ontogenetic flexibility but which also entails the loss of control from a single centralized meristem to one or more meristems. A shift from the constraints of symmetry to the risks and potential of asymmetry and a subsequent diversity of heritable thallus forms reflect evolutionary processes in the Cladoniaceae. Similar morphogenetic activities, which are apparently highly conserved, are shared by species that are presumably only distantly related.