Male sterility of higher plants is multiform in pollen abortion and has varied and complicated mechanisms. It is an active field to probe the mechanisms. Recently, some new results in this field have been obtained by using the methods of cell biology, including the structure and function of tapetal cell, the changes in Ca(2+) distribution, ATPase activity distribution, cytoskeleton array and programmed cell death in anther cells. All of the results gave us some new understanding for the process of pollen abortion. These results will make a link between the researches of individual and molecular level in male sterility of higher plants, and help us understand the mechanisms of male sterility of higher plants. This paper summarizes the knowledge about aborting process of male sterile anther obtained by the methods of cell biology.