Related papers: Modelling how curved active proteins and shear flo…
We provide a minimal model for an active nematic film in contact with both a solid substrate and a passive isotropic fluid, and explore its dynamics in one and two dimensions using a combination of hybrid Lattice Boltzmann simulations and…
Molecular-motor generated active stresses drive the cytoskeleton away from equilibrium, endowing it with tunable mechanical properties that are essential for diverse functions such as cell division and motility[1-5]. Designing analogous…
When the motion of a motile cell is observed closely, it appears erratic, and yet the combination of nonequilibrium forces and surfaces can produce striking examples of organization in microbial systems. While most of our current…
We perform an analytical investigation of the cell interface dynamics in the framework of a minimal phase field model of cell motility suggested in [1], which consists of two coupled evolution equations for the order parameter and a…
Cells are modeled with spherical grains connected each other. Each cell can shrink and swell by transporting its fluid content to other connected neighbor while still maintaining its density at constant value. As a spherical part of a cell…
The actomyosin cytoskeleton, a protein assembly comprising actin fibers and the myosin molecular motor, drives various cellular dynamics through contractile force generation at high densities. However, the relationship between the density…
In the framework of a phase field model of a single cell crawling on a substrate, we investigate how the properties of the cell membrane affect the shape and motility of the cell. Since the membrane influences the cell dynamics on multiple…
We present a generic model of cell motility generated by acto-myosin contraction of the cell cortex. We identify analytically dynamical instabilities of the cortex and show that they trigger spontaneous cortical flows which in turn can…
In eukaryotic cell chemotaxis, cells extend and retract transient actin-driven protrusions at their membrane that facilitate both the detection of external chemical gradients and directional movement via the formation of focal adhesions…
Eukaryotic cell motility is crucial during development, wound healing, the immune response, and cancer metastasis. Some eukaryotic cells can swim, but cells more commonly adhere to and crawl along the extracellular matrix. We study the…
The multicellular organization of diverse systems, such as embryos, intestines and tumours, relies on the coordinated migration of cells in 3D curved environments. In these settings, cells establish supracellular patterns of motion,…
Experiments suggest that the migration of some cells in the three-dimensional extra cellular matrix bears strong resemblance to one-dimensional cell migration. Motivated by this observation, we construct and study a minimal one-dimensional…
Living systems are chiral on multiple scales, from constituent biopolymers to large scale morphology, and their active mechanics is both driven by chiral components and serves to generate chiral morphologies. We describe the mechanics of…
Cell migration plays a fundamental role in numerous physiological processes, including embryonic development, wound healing, and cancer metastasis. While cell-cell adhesion is known to regulate motion by shaping cell morphology and…
Actin flow in the cortical cytoskeleton underneath the cell membrane generates mechanical stresses that shape the cell surface. We study this mechanism using a hydrodynamic model of a compressible active gel polymerizing at the membrane and…
The optimal shapes attained by contractile cells on adhesive substrates are determined by the interplay between intracellular forces and adhesion with the extracellular matrix. We model the cell as a contractile film bounded by an elastic…
Viewed under a fluorescence microscope, the actomyosin cytoskeleton presents vivid streaks of lines together with persistent oscillatory waves. Using an active hydrodynamic approach, we show how a uniform distribution of single or mixture…
This paper deals with flow-induced shape transitions of elastic capsules. The state of the art concerning both theory and experiments is briefly reviewed starting with dynamically induced small deformation of initially spherical capsules…
The motor part of a crawling eukaryotic cell can be represented schematically as an active continuum layer. The main active processes in this layer are protrusion, originating from non-equilibrium polymerization of actin fibers,…
Biological processes, from morphogenesis to tumor invasion, spontaneously generate shear stresses inside living tissue. The mechanisms that govern the transmission of mechanical forces in epithelia and the collective response of the tissue…