About the author

Hiroo Fukuda

Hiroo Fukuda is Professor of Plant Cell Biology at the Department of Biological Sciences, University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan, and head of the Morphology Group at the Plant Science Center, RIKEN (Rikagaku Kenkyusho), Yokohama, Japan. Ever since he established a single-cell transdifferentiation system in 1980 during his Ph.D. studies, he has developed his interest in plant transdifferentiation and vascular-tissue formation. At present, his group is mainly working on the cell–cell communication that governs tissue-pattern formation, the execution mechanism of programmed cell death, the gene-regulatory network that controls transdifferentiation, and intracellular-vesicle transports that support the ordered cell-wall architecture.