Related papers: Optimality of contraction-driven crawling
Soft robots offer a frontier in robotics with enormous potential for safe human-robot interaction and agility in uncertain environments. A stepping stone towards unlocking their potential is a control theory tailored to soft robotics,…
There are numerous scenarios in which populations of cells migrate in crowded environments. Typical examples include wound healing, cancer growth and embryo development. In these crowded environments cells are able to interact with each…
Cells exert traction forces on compliant substrates and can induce surface instabilities that appear as characteristic wrinkling patterns. Here, we develop a mechanical description of cell-induced wrinkling on soft substrates using a thin…
We present a continuum level analytical model of a droplet of active contractile fluid consisting of filaments and motors. We calculate the steady state flows that result from a splayed polarisation of the filaments. We account for the…
The collective motion of microorganisms and microrobots can be used for particle delivery, especially when guided by external magnetic fields, phototaxis, or chemotaxis. This cargo transport is enhanced significantly by hydrodynamic…
Many living and physical systems such as cell aggregates, tissues or bacterial colonies behave as unconventional systems of particles that are strongly constrained by volume exclusion and shape interactions. Understanding how these…
During migration cells exhibit a rich variety of seemingly random migration patterns, which makes unraveling the underlying mechanisms that control cell migration a daunting challenge. For efficient migration cells require a mechanism for…
We present experimental and numerical results for a model crawler which is able to extract net positional changes from reciprocal shape changes, i.e. 'breathing-like' deformations, thanks to directional, frictional interactions with a…
Intercellular signaling has an important role in organism development, but not all communication occurs using the same mechanism. Here, we analyze the energy efficiency of intercellular signaling by two canonical mechanisms: diffusion of…
The physical and bio-mechanical principles that govern undulatory movement on wet surfaces have important applications in physiology, physics, and engineering. The nematode {\it C. elegans}, with its highly stereotypical and functionally…
The twisting and writhing of a cell body and associated mechanical stresses is an underappreciated constraint on microbial self-propulsion. Multi-flagellated bacteria can even buckle and writhe under their own activity as they swim through…
We use a computational phase-field model together with analytical analysis to study how inter-cellular active forces can mediate individual cell morphology and collective motion in a confluent cell monolayer. Contractile inter-cellular…
Branched actin networks at the leading edge of a crawling cell evolve via protein-regulated processes such as polymerization, depolymerization, capping, branching, and severing. A formulation of these processes is presented and analyzed to…
The actin cortex is a thin layer of actin filaments and myosin motors beneath the outer membrane of animal cells. It determines the cells' mechanical properties and forms important morphological structures. Physical descriptions of the…
Many types of motile cells perform durotaxis, namely, directed migration following gradients of substrate stiffness. Recent experiments have revealed that cell monolayers can migrate toward stiffer regions even when individual cells do not…
Groups of cells, including clusters of cancerous cells, multicellular organisms, and developing organs, may both grow and break apart. What physical factors control these fractures? In these processes, what sets the eventual size of…
Current mathematical frameworks for predicting the flux state and macromolecular composition of the cell do not rely on thermodynamic constraints to determine the spontaneous direction of reactions. These predictions may be biologically…
The quest on how to collectively self-organize in order to maximize the survival chances of the members of a social group requires finding an optimal compromise between maximizing the well-being of an individual and that of the group. Here…
We present a continuum model of the coupling between cells and substrate that accounts for some of the observed substrate-stiffness dependence of cell properties. The cell is modeled as an elastic active gel, adapting recently developed…
A propagating "beam" triggering a local phase transition in a nematic elastomer sets it into a crawling motion, which may morph due to buckling. We consider the motion of the various configurations of slender rods and thin stripes with both…