ABSTRACT
The application of casting to plant histology is an example of those numerous and profitable technological “odd-jobs”, sometimes “breakthroughs”, so common in research laboratories, where the idea is to find a principle, an accessory, or a product, and to apply it to serve new functions. The principle of casting is simple and well known, and the idea of materializing the lumina of vessels so as to follow their course and ramifications in a tissue or organ more easily and to understand their organization in three dimensions was not novel. During the 1980s, exploration of the vascular system also proceeded in directions other than casting. In the 1990s, Fujii took up the researches of his predecessors, attempting mainly to identify woody species from morphological characters of their wood vessels revealed by casting.
