Related papers: Interplay between substrate rigidity and tissue fl…

Epithelial monolayers are some of the best-studied models for collective cell migration due to their abundance in multicellular systems and their tractability. Experimentally, the collective migration of epithelial monolayers can be…

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…

Collective migration -- the directed, coordinated motion of many self-propelled agents -- is a fascinating emergent behavior exhibited by active matter that has key functional implications for biological systems. Extensive studies have…

Many bacteria rely on active cell appendages, such as type IV pili, to move over substrates and interact with neighboring cells. Here, we study the motion of individual cells and bacterial colonies, mediated by the collective interactions…

Swarming or collective motion of living entities is one of the most common and spectacular manifestations of living systems having been extensively studied in recent years. A number of general principles have been established. The…

The motility of a cell can be triggered or inhibited not only by an applied force but also by a mechanically neutral force couple. This type of loading, represented by an applied stress and commonly interpreted as either squeezing or…

The elastic moduli of tissues are connected to their states of health and function. The epithelial monolayer is a simple, minimal, tissue model that is often used to gain understanding of mechanical behavior at the cellular or…

Brittle materials fail catastrophically. In consequence of their limited flaw-tolerance, failure occurs by localized fracture and is typically a dynamic process. Recently, experiments on epithelial cell monolayers have revealed that this…

Cell layers eliminate unwanted cells through the extrusion process, which underlines healthy versus flawed tissue behaviors. Although several biochemical pathways have been identified, the underlying mechanical basis including the forces…

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…

Based on a cellular automaton model the growth kinetics and the critical surface dynamics of cell monolayers is systematically studied by variation of the cell migration activity, the size of the proliferation zone and the cell cycle time…

The sliding friction force exerted by stochastic linkers interacting with a moving filament is calculated. The elastic properties of the substrate on which the linkers are anchored are shown to strongly influence the friction force. In some…

We extend a model for the morphology and dynamics of a crawling eukaryotic cell to describe cells on micropatterned substrates. This model couples cell morphology, adhesion, and cytoskeletal flow in response to active stresses induced by…

Adhesion-independent migration is a prominent mode of cell motility in confined environments, yet the physical principles that guide such movement remain incompletely understood. We present a phase-field model for simulating the motility of…

Control of cell proliferation is a fundamental aspect of tissue physiology central to morphogenesis, wound healing and cancer. Although many of the molecular genetic factors are now known, the system level regulation of growth is still…

We generated a computational approach to analyze the biomechanics of epithelial cell aggregates, either island or stripes or entire monolayers, that combines both vertex and contact-inhibition-of-locomotion models to include both cell-cell…

Many of the cell membrane vital functions are achieved by the self-organization of the proteins and biopolymers embedded in it. The protein dynamics are in part determined by its drag. A large number of these proteins can polymerize to form…

Many critical biological processes, like wound healing, require confluent cell monolayers/bulk tissues to transition from a jammed solid-like to a fluid-like state. Although numerical studies anticipate changes in the cell shape alone can…

Constructing physical models of living cells and tissues is an extremely challenging task because of the high complexities of both intra- and intercellular processes. In addition, the force that a single cell generates vanishes in total due…

Biological tissues exhibit complex behaviors with their dynamics often resembling inert soft matter such as liquids, polymers, colloids, and liquid crystals. These analogies enable physics-based approaches for investigations of emergent…