Related papers: Branch Mode Selection during Early Lung Developmen…
Proper lung functioning requires not only a correct structure of the conducting airway tree, but also the simultaneous development of smooth muscles and vasculature. Lung branching morphogenesis is strongly stereotyped and involves the…
Branching morphogenesis generates epithelial trees which facilitate gas exchange, filtering, as well as secretion processes with their large surface to volume ratio. In this review, we focus on the developmental mechanisms that control the…
Many organs of higher organisms are heavily branched structures and arise by an at first sight similar process of branching morphogenesis. Yet the regulatory components and local interactions that have been identified differ greatly in…
A common developmental process, called branching morphogenesis, generates the epithelial trees in a variety of organs, including the lungs, kidneys, and glands. How branching morphogenesis can create epithelial architectures of very…
The main signalling proteins that control early kidney branching have been defined. Yet the underlying mechanism is still elusive. We have previously shown that a Schnakenberg-type Turing mechanism can recapitulate the branching and protein…
During organogenesis tissue grows and deforms. The growth processes are controlled by diffusible proteins, so-called morphogens. Many different patterning mechanisms have been proposed. The stereotypic branching program during lung…
Branched structures that evolve over time critically determine the function of various natural and engineered systems, including growing vasculature, neural arborization, pulmonary networks such as lungs, river basins, power distribution…
The development of long bones requires a sophisticated spatial organization of cellular signaling, proliferation, and differentiation programs. How such spatial organization emerges on the growing long bone domain is still unresolved. Based…
Organogenesis has been studied for decades, but fundamental questions regarding the control of growth and shape remain unsolved. We have recently shown that of all proposed mathematical models only ligand-receptor based Turing models…
Channel formation and branching is widely seen in physical systems where movement of fluid through a porous structure causes the spatiotemporal evolution of the medium in response to the flow, in turn causing flow pathways to evolve. We…
Many biological networks grow by elongation of filaments that can branch and fuse -- typical examples include fungal mycelium or slime mold. These networks must simultaneously perform multiple tasks such as transport, exploration, and…
Notch signaling is an evolutionary conserved cell-cell communication pathway. Besides regulating cell-fate decisions at an individual cell level, Notch signaling coordinates the emergent spatiotemporal patterning in a tissue through…
Turing mechanisms can yield a large variety of patterns from noisy, homogenous initial conditions and have been proposed as patterning mechanism for many developmental processes. However, the molecular components that give rise to Turing…
Kidney branching morphogenesis has been studied extensively, but the mechanism that defines the branch points is still elusive. Here we obtained a 2D movie of kidney branching morphogenesis in culture to test different models of branching…
Understanding the rules underlying organismal development is a major unsolved problem in biology. Each cell in a developing organism responds to signals in its local environment by dividing, excreting, consuming, or reorganizing, yet how…
The seemingly simple process of inhalation relies on a complex interplay between muscular contraction in the thorax, elasto-capillary interactions in individual lung branches, propagation of air between different connected branches, and…
An understanding of the underlying mechanism of side--branching is paramount in controlling and/or therapeutically treating mammalian organs, such as lungs, kidneys, and glands. Motivated by an activator-inhibitor-substrate approach that is…
Turing models have been proposed to explain the emergence of digits during limb development. However, so far the molecular components that would give rise to Turing patterns are elusive. We have recently shown that a particular type of…
Space-saving design is a requirement that is encountered in biological systems and the development of modern technological devices alike. Many living organisms dynamically pack their polymer chains, filaments or membranes inside of…
Computational models of the respiratory central pattern generator (rCPG) are usually based on biologically-plausible Hodgkin Huxley neuron models. Such models require numerous parameters and thus are prone to overfitting. The HH approach is…