Ropod: A Customizable Toolkit for Non-Invasive Root Imaging Reveals Cell Type-Specific Dynamics of Plant Autophagy

The study introduces RoPod, a toolkit designed for low-stress live time-lapse imaging of Arabidopsis roots, which includes a customizable 3D-printed vessel for simultaneous growth and imaging. RoPod minimizes sample handling impact, preserves live samples for extended imaging, and allows treatment applications during imaging. The toolkit has advanced the understanding of plant autophagy by providing high time resolution for autophagy responses to chemical modulators and revealing cell type-specific changes. This contributes to a deeper understanding of autophagy's physiological role and offers guidelines for sampling times in plant autophagy research.