Related papers: Fluids as Dynamic Templates for Cytoskeletal Prote…
A simple model of an active colloid consisting of dumbbell-shaped particles that cyclically change their length without propelling themselves is proposed and analyzed. At nanoscales, it represents an idealization for bacterial cytoplasm or…
We perform an analytical investigation of the cell interface dynamics in the framework of a minimal phase field model of cell motility suggested in [1], which consists of two coupled evolution equations for the order parameter and a…
In the cellular phenomena of cytoplasmic streaming, molecular motors carrying cargo along a network of microtubules entrain the surrounding fluid. The piconewton forces produced by individual motors are sufficient to deform long…
In this article, we study in details the fluid dynamics system proposed in Clarelli et al (2013) to model the formation of cyanobacteria biofilms. After analyzing the linear stability of the unique non trivial equilibrium of the system, we…
Cell blebs are protrusions of the cell membrane and can be instrumental for cell migration. We derive a continuum model for the mechanical and geometrical aspects of the onset of blebbing in terms of a force balance. It is abstract and…
Biological cells are able to adapt their behaviour in response to environmental cues. Durotaxis is a phenomenon in which cells adjust their migration depending on the mechanical properties of a surrounding substrate. Although durotaxis has…
With exquisite precision and reproducibility, cells orchestrate the cooperative action of thousands of nanometer-sized molecular motors to carry out mechanical tasks at much larger length scales, such as cell motility, division and…
Ciliated tissues such as in the mammalian lungs, brains, and reproductive tracts, are specialized to pump fluid. They generate flows by the collective activity of hundreds of thousands of individual cilia that beat in a striking metachronal…
Life in complex systems, such as cities and organisms, comes to a standstill when global coordination of mass, energy, and information flows is disrupted. Global coordination is no less important in single cells, especially in large oocytes…
Active gel theory has recently been very successful in describing biologically active materials such as actin filaments or moving bacteria in temporally fixed and simple geometries such as cubes or spheres. Here we develop a computational…
As motivated by studies of cellular motility driven by spatiotemporal chemotactic gradients in microdevices, we develop a framework for constructing approximate analytical solutions for the location, speed and cellular densities for cell…
From cytoskeletal networks to tissues, many biological systems behave as active materials. Their composition and stress-generation is affected by chemical reaction networks. In such systems, the coupling between mechanics and chemistry…
We present a generic framework for modelling three-dimensional deformable shells of active matter that captures the orientational dynamics of the active particles and hydrodynamic interactions on the shell and with the surrounding…
Narrow membrane tubes are commonly pulled out from the surface of phospholipid vesicles using forces applied either through laser or magnetic tweezers or through the action of processive motor proteins. Recent examples have emerged where…
The cytoskeleton -- a collection of polymeric filaments, molecular motors, and crosslinkers -- is a foundational example of active matter, and in the cell assembles into organelles that guide basic biological functions. Simulation of…
To insight the relationships between the self-organizing structures of cells, such as the cell clusters, and the properties of biotissues is helpful in revealing the function and designing biomaterial. Traditional random foam model neglects…
We study theoretically the viscoelastic properties of sheared binary fluids that have strong dynamical asymmetry between the two components. The dynamical asymmetry arises due to asymmetry between the viscoelastic stresses, particularly the…
Molecular motor proteins form the basis of cellular dynamics. Recently, notable efforts have led to the creation of their DNA-based mimics, which can carry out complex nanoscale motion. However, such functional analogues have not yet been…
The deposition of a viscoplastic fluid onto a substrate can be achieved by simply moving apart two plates initially separated by a fluid filled gap, where the footprint shape depends on the initiation of a fingering instability. Here, we…
Chloroplasts regulate their growth to optimize photosynthesis. Quantitative data shows that the ratio of total chloroplast area to mesophyll cell area is constant across different cells within a single species, and also across species.…