Related papers: Microtubule organization and cell geometry
Cylindrical interfaces occur in sheared or deformed emulsions and as biological or technological lipid monolayer or bilayer tubules. Like the corresponding spherical droplets and vesicles, these cylinder-like surfaces may host orientaional…
Controlling the collective motion of epithelial cell populations is fundamental for understanding multicellular self-organization and for advancing tissue engineering. Under spatial confinement, cells are known to exhibit either vortex…
The organization of live cells into tissues and their subsequent biological function involves inter-cell mechanical interactions, which are mediated by their elastic environment. To model this interaction, we consider cells as spherical…
Rigidity transitions in simple models of confluent cells have been a powerful organizing principle in understanding the dynamics and mechanics of dense biological tissue. In this work we explore the interplay between geometry and rigidity…
A long-standing challenge is designing multi-scale structures with good connectivity between cells while optimizing each cell to reach close to the theoretical performance limit. We propose a new method for direct multi-scale topology…
Many cellular processes rely on the cell's ability to transport material to and from the nucleus. Networks consisting of many microtubules and actin filaments are key to this transport. Recently, the inhibition of intracellular transport…
The cortical array is a structure consisting of highly aligned microtubules which plays a crucial role in the characteristic uniaxial expansion of all growing plant cells. Recent experiments have shown polymerization-driven collisions…
Morphogenesis emerges from dynamic feedback among geometry, mechanics, and chemistry; however, disentangling these contributions in living systems remains challenging. Here, we focus on the interplay between geometry and mechanics by…
Recent biological experiments have shown that certain types of cells are able to move in structured and confined environment even without the activation of focal adhesion. Focusing on this particular phenomenon and based on previous works,…
Inspired by patterns observed in mixtures of microtubules and molecular motors, we propose continuum equations for the evolution of motor density, and microtubule orientation. The chief ingredients are the transport of motors along tubules,…
Directional growth caused by gravitropism and corresponding bending of plant cells has been explored since 19th century, however, many aspects of mechanisms underlying the perception of gravity at the molecular level are still not well…
Biological cells can actively tune their intracellular architecture according to their overall shape. Here we explore the rheological implication of such coupling in a minimal model of a dense cellular material where each cell exerts an…
In vivo and in vitro cells rely on the support of an underlying biocompatible substrate, such as the extracellular matrix or a culture substrate, to spread and proliferate. The mechanical and chemical properties of such structures play a…
Ordered polarity alignment of a cell population plays a vital role in biology, such as in hair follicle alignment and asymmetric cell division. Here, we propose a theoretical framework for the understanding of generic dynamical properties…
Regulating the stability of microtubule(MT)-kinetochore attachments is fundamental to avoiding mitotic errors and ensure proper chromosome segregation during cell division. While biochemical factors involved in this process have been…
Inside cells, various cargos are transported by teams of molecular motors. Intriguingly, the motors involved generally have opposite pulling directions, and the resulting cargo dynamics is a biased stochastic motion. It is an open question…
The migration of cells is relevant for processes such as morphogenesis, wound healing, and invasion of cancer cells. In order to move, single cells deform cyclically. However, it is not understood how these shape oscillations influence…
The behaviour and fate of tissue cells is controlled by the rigidity and geometry of their adhesive environment, possibly through forces localized to sites of adhesion. We introduce a mechanical model that predicts cellular force…
Cell-cell adhesion is one the most fundamental mechanisms regulating collective cell migration during tissue development, homeostasis and repair, allowing cell populations to self-organize and eventually form and maintain complex tissue…
This paper describes an investigation into part of the mechanical mechanisms underlying the formation of mitotic spindle, the cellular machinery responsible for chromosomal separation during cell division. In normal eukaryotic cells,…