Plants, as sessile organisms, must coordinate various physiological processes to adapt to ever-changing surrounding environments. Stomata, the epidermal pores facilitating gas and water exchange, play important roles in optimizing photosynthetic efficiency and adaptability. Stomatal development is under the control of an intrinsic program mediated by a secretory peptide gene familynamely, EPIDERMAL PATTERNING FACTOR, including positively acting STOMAGEN/EPFL9. The phytohormone brassinosteroids and environment factor light also control stomatal production. However, whether auxin regulates stomatal development and whether peptide signaling is coordinated with auxin signaling in the regulation of stomatal development remain largely unknown. Here we show that auxin negatively regulates stomatal development through MONOPTEROS (also known as ARF5) repression of the mobile peptide gene STOMAGEN in mesophyll. Through physiological, genetic, transgenic, biochemical, and molecular analyses, we demonstrate that auxin inhibits stomatal development through the nuclear receptor TIR1/AFB-mediated signaling, and that MONOPTEROS directly binds to the STOMAGEN promoter to suppress its expression in mesophyll and inhibit stomatal development. Our results provide a paradigm of cross-talk between phytohormone auxin and peptide signaling in the regulation of stomatal production.A uxin is the first identified phytohormone, which exerts multifaceted influences on plant growth and development, such as embryonic root initiation (1, 2), shoot apical meristem function (3), and floral primordia initiation (4). As a "molecular glue," auxin facilitates the formation of its coreceptor complexes comprising F-box proteins (TIR1/AFBs) and AUXIN/INDOLE-3-ACETIC ACID proteins (AUX/IAAs), and subsequent AUX/ IAAs ubiquitination and degradation by 26S proteasome, thus releasing auxin response factors (ARFs) from AUX/IAAs repression to regulate auxin-responsive gene expression by either activation or repression (2, 3, 5-11). Although many physiologic processes are reported to be regulated by auxin (1-4, 6, 12), the full understanding of the functions of this versatile phytohormone has not been reached.Stomata, the pores flanked by a pair of guard cells, mainly constitute the epidermis of plant leaves together with trichomes and neighboring pavement cells that separate stomata to maintain the one-cell spacing rule (13,14). As a gas and water passage between external environment and internal plant tissue, stomata play important roles in photosynthesis and global carbon and water circulation (15). Stomatal generation undergoes several stages, including meristemoid mother cell, meristemoid, guard mother cell, and guard cells, which is modulated by an intrinsic program (14) mainly involving putative peptide ligands [EPI-DERMAL PATTERNING FACTOR (EPF) family] (16-20), membrane proteins (receptor-like protein TMM and receptorlike kinase ERECTA family) (21-23), MAPK cascades (protein kinase YDA, MKK4/5/7/9, and MPK3/6) (24-26), and transcription factors (bHLH...