Quantitative analysis of lateral root development with time-lapse imaging and deep neural network

During lateral root (LR) development, morphological alteration of the developing single LR primordium occurs continuously. Precise observation of this continuous alteration is important for understanding the mechanism involved in single LR development. Recently, we reported that very long-chain fatty acids are important signalling molecules that regulate LR development. In the study, we developed an efficient method to quantify the transition of single LR developmental stages using time-lapse imaging followed by a deep neural network (DNN) analysis. In this 'insight' paper, we discuss our DNN method and the importance of time-lapse imaging in studies on plant development. Integrating DNN analysis and imaging is a powerful technique for the quantification of the timing of the transition of organ morphology; it can become an important method to elucidate spatiotemporal molecular mechanisms in plant development.