Drawing on the latest research in genetics, molecular biology, microscopy, intercellular and intracellular signaling and model plants, Galun (The Weizmann Institute of Science, Israel) provides comprehensive information on all the main organs of flowering plants and describes the mechanisms by which plants regulate their patterning. He begins with basic issues such as plant hormones and the cytoskeleton of plant cells and progresses to phylogeny, taxonomy, gene duplication, the regulation of gene expression and systems biology. He then examines the patterning of plant components in detail, describing the patterning of the angiosperm embryo, the shoot apical meristem, the patterning of roots, the vegetative shoot and transition to flowering, the angiosperm leaf and the patterning of flowers and their members.