The plant shoot apical meristem holds a stem cell niche from which all aerial organs originate. Using a computational approach we show that a mixture of monomers and heterodimers of the transcription factors WUSCHEL and HAIRY MERISTEM is sufficient to pattern the stem cell niche, and predict that immobile heterodimers form a regulatory “pocket” surrounding the stem cells. The model achieves to reproduce an array of perturbations, including mutants and tissue size modifications. We also show its ability to reproduce the recently observed dynamical shift of the stem cell niche during the development of an axillary meristem. The work integrates recent experimental results to answer the longstanding question of how the asymmetry of expression between the stem cell marker CLAVATA3 and its activator WUSCHEL is achieved, and recent findings of plasticity in the system.

植物茎尖分生组织具有干细胞生态位，所有气生器官都起源于此。使用一种计算方法，我们表明，转录因子WUSCHEL和HAIRY MERISTEM的单体和异二聚体的混合物足以使干细胞生态位模式化，并预测固定异源二聚体会形成围绕干细胞的调节“口袋”。该模型可以重现一系列扰动，包括突变和组织大小修改。我们还显示了其在腋生分生组织的发育过程中繁殖最近观察到的干细胞生态位动态变化的能力。这项工作整合了最新的实验结果，以回答长期存在的问题，即干细胞标记物CLAVATA3及其激活剂之间的表达不对称性如何。WUSCHEL实现了，并且最近在系统中发现了可塑性。