Related papers: Interfacial friction dictates long-range force pro…
We study interactions between biological cells that apply anisotropic active mechanical forces on an elastic substrate. We model the cells as thin discs that along their perimeters apply radial, but angle-dependent forces on the substrate.…
We investigate the mechanical properties of a layered material with interlayer friction. We propose a model that contains lateral elasticity and interlayer friction to obtain the response function both in the Fourier and real spaces. By…
As small particles skim our airways during breathing, or our intestines during digestion, the surface epithelium is subjected to local exogenous shear that deforms hundreds to thousands of tightly interacting cells. Unlike shear…
Using a minimal model of cells or cohesive cell layers as continuum active elastic media, we examine the effect of substrate thickness and stiffness on traction forces exerted by strongly adhering cells. We obtain a simple expression for…
The shapes of epithelial tissues result from a complex interplay of contractile forces in the cytoskeleta of the cells in the tissue, and adhesion forces between them. A host of discrete, cell-based models describe these forces by assigning…
The properties of tissue interfaces -- between separate populations of cells, or between a group of cells and its environment -- has attracted intense theoretical, computational, and experimental study. Recent work on shape-based models…
In vivo, eukaryotic cells are embedded in a matrix environment, where they grow and develop. Generally, this extracellular matrix (ECM) is an anisotropic fibrous structure, through which macromolecules and biochemical signaling molecules at…
In development and homeostasis, multi-cellular systems exhibit spatial and temporal heterogeneity in their biochemical and mechanical properties. Nevertheless, it remains unclear how spatiotemporally heterogeneous forces affect the…
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…
Transmission matrices, mapping the propagation of light from one end of the tissue to the other, form an important mathematical tool in the analysis of tissue scattering and the design of wavefront shaping systems. To understand the…
We propose a simple mathematical model to describe the mechanical relaxation of cells within a curved epithelial tissue layer represented by an arbitrary curve in two-dimensional space. This model generalises previous one-dimensional models…
Biological cells in soft materials can be modeled as anisotropic force contraction dipoles. The corresponding elastic interaction potentials are long-ranged ($\sim 1/r^3$ with distance $r$) and depend sensitively on elastic constants,…
This study builds upon a model proposed by Joanny and collaborators that examines the dynamics of interfaces between two distinct cell populations, particularly during tumor growth in healthy tissues. This framework leads to the…
Biopolymer Networks play an important role in coordinating and regulating collective cellular dynamics via a number of signaling pathways. Here, we investigate the mechanical response of a model biopolymer network due to the active…
Biological cells embedded in fibrous matrices have been observed to form inter-cellular bands of dense and aligned fibers, through which they mechanically interact over long distances. Such matrix-mediated cellular interactions have been…
We investigate morphologies of proliferating cellular tissue using a newly developed numerical simulation model for mechanical cell division. The model reproduces structures of simple multi-cellular organisms via simple rules for selective…
The importance of molecular-scale forces in sculpting biological form and function has been acknowledged for more than a century. Accounting for forces in biology is a problem that lies at the intersection of soft condensed matter physics,…
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 measurement of cellular traction forces on soft elastic substrates has become a standard tool for many labs working on mechanobiology. Here we review the basic principles and different variants of this approach. In general, the…
Cellularized tissue and polymer networks can both transition from floppy to rigid as a function of their control parameters, and, yet, the two systems often mechanically interact, which may affect their respective rigidities. To study this…