Related papers: Active Spaghetti: Collective Organization in Cyano…
Collective cell migration plays an essential role in various biological processes, such as development or cancer proliferation. While cell-cell interactions are clearly key determinants of collective cell migration -- in addition to…
The actin cytoskeleton is a key component in the machinery of eukaryotic cells, and it selfassembles out of equilibrium into a wide variety of biologically crucial structures. While the molecular mechanisms involved are well characterized,…
Locomotion of bacteria by actin polymerization, and in vitro motion of spherical beads coated with a protein catalyzing polymerization, are examples of active motility. Starting from a simple model of forces locally normal to the surface of…
In growing active matter systems, a large collection of engineered or living autonomous units metabolize free energy and create order at different length scales as they proliferate and migrate collectively. One such example is bacterial…
The self-organization of microbial ecosystems involves a large variety of mechanisms, ranging from biochemical signaling to population dynamics. Among these, the role of motility regulation has been little studied, despite the importance of…
From flocking birds to schooling fish, organisms interact to form collective dynamics across the natural world. Self-organization is present at smaller scales as well: cells interact and move during development to produce patterns in fish…
Collective motion is a phenomenon observed across length scales in nature, from bacterial swarming and tissue migration to the flocking of animals. The mechanisms underlying this behavior vary significantly depending on the biological…
Motile cilia are a striking example of functional cellular organelle, conserved across all the eukaryotic species. Motile cilia allow swimming of cells and small organisms and transport of liquids across epithelial tissues. Whilst the…
The self-organised motion of vast numbers of creatures in a single direction is a spectacular example of emergent order. We recreate this phenomenon using actuated non-living components. We report here that millimetre-sized tapered rods,…
Collective behaviour is a widespread phenomenon in biology, cutting through a huge span of scales, from cell colonies up to bird flocks and fish schools. The most prominent trait of collective behaviour is the emergence of global order:…
Using a simple model, we study the fluctuating dynamics of inextensible, semiflexible polar filaments interacting with active and directed force generating centres such as molecular motors. Taking into account the fact that the activity…
Several types of active agents self-propel by spinning around their propulsion axis, thus behaving as active screws. Examples include cytoskeletal filaments in gliding assays, magnetically-driven colloidal helices, and microorganisms like…
Myxococcus xanthus cells self-organize into aligned groups, clusters, at various stages of their lifecycle. Formation of these clusters is crucial for the complex dynamic multi-cellular behavior of these bacteria. However, the mechanism…
Active matter comprises individual units that convert energy into mechanical motion. In many examples, such as bacterial systems and biofilament assays, constituent units are elongated and can give rise to local nematic orientational order.…
After summarizing basic features of self-organization such as entropy export, feedbacks and nonlinear dynamics, we discuss several examples in biology. The main part of the paper is devoted to a model of active Brownian motion that allows a…
Experimental studies of cell motility in culture have shown that under adequate conditions these living organisms possess the ability to organize themselves into complex structures. Such structures may exhibit a synergy that greatly…
Bacterial swarming is a rapid mass-migration, in which thousands of cells spread collectively to colonize a surface. Physically, swarming is a natural example of active particles that use energy to generate motion. Accordingly,…
Intracellular transport is vital for the proper functioning and survival of a cell. Cargo (proteins, vesicles, organelles, etc.) is transferred from its place of creation to its target locations via molecular motor assisted transport along…
Self-organization and pattern formation in network-organized systems emerges from the collective activation and interaction of many interconnected units. A striking feature of these non-equilibrium structures is that they are often…
In many adult tissues, stem cells and differentiated cells are not homogeneously distributed : stem cells are arranged in periodic "niches", and differentiated cells are constantly produced and migrate out of these niches. In this article,…