Whether a plant grows or not can be a matter of survival. Recent research has pointed to a type of phytohormone that can control whole plant growth when acting in a subset of cells.
The EU-funded SIDEWAYS (Final size determination through spatio-temporal regulation of phytohormone signaling pathways) project has investigated brassinosteroids (BRs) to work out how their chemical signals can control final size.
Further details: Growth control in plants – a matter of balance