Related papers: Size-dependent self-avoidance enables superdiffusi…
Cells can show not only spontaneous movement but also tactic responses to environmental signals. Since the former can be regarded as the basis to realize the latter, playing essential roles in various cellular functions, it is important to…
In recent years the functionality of synthetic active microparticles has edged even closer to that of their biological counterparts. However, we still lack the understanding needed to recreate at the microscale key features of autonomous…
Intracellular transport of large cargoes, such as organelles, vesicles or large proteins, is a complex dynamical process that involves the interplay of ATP-consuming molecular motors, cytoskeleton filaments and the viscoelastic cytoplasm.…
How are granular details of stochastic growth and division of individual cells reflected in smooth deterministic growth of population numbers? We provide an integrated, multiscale perspective of microbial growth dynamics by formulating a…
P. polycephalum may be considered as a spatially represented parallel unconventional computing substrate, but how can this `computer' be programmed? In this paper we examine and catalogue individual low-level mechanisms which may be used to…
In cell membranes, proteins and lipids diffuse in a highly crowded and heterogeneous landscape, where aggregates and dense domains of proteins or lipids obstruct the path of diffusing molecules. In general, hindered motion gives rise to…
Immotile microbes inhabit nearly every environment on Earth, from soils and sediments to food matrices -- yet how they disperse through these physically confining environments is poorly understood. Here, we show that immotile microbial…
Collective motion of cells is critical to some of the most vital tasks including wound healing, development, and immune response [Friedl and Gilmour 2009; Tokarski et al. 2012; Lee et al. 2012; Beltman et al. 2009], and is common to many…
Anomalous diffusion or, more generally, anomalous transport, with nonlinear dependence of the mean-squared displacement on the measurement time, is ubiquitous in nature. It has been observed in processes ranging from microscopic movement of…
Throughout developmental biology and ecology, transport can be driven by nonlocal interactions. Examples include cells that migrate based on contact with pseudopodia extended from other cells, and animals that move based on their vision of…
Immune cells have evolved to recognize and eliminate pathogens, and the efficiency of this process can be measured in a Petri dish. Yet, even if the cells are time-lapse recorded and tracked with high resolution, it is difficult to judge…
Cell type (e.g. pluripotent cell, fibroblast) is the end result of many complex processes that unfold due to evolutionary, developmental, and transformational stimuli. A cell's phenotype and the discrete, a priori states that define various…
Based on symmetry consideration of migration and shape deformations, we formulate phenomenologically the dynamics of cell crawling in two dimensions. Forces are introduced to change the cell shape. The shape deformations induce migration of…
We propose a novel approach to modeling cell migration in an anisotropic environment with biochemical heterogeneity and interspecies interactions, using as a paradigm glioma invasion in brain tissue under the influence of hypoxia-triggered…
Motility is an essential factor for an organism's survival and diversification. With the advent of novel single-cell technologies, analytical frameworks and theoretical methods, we can begin to probe the complex lives of microscopic motile…
The present study investigates the effect of temperature-induced change of phase from face centred cubic solid to liquid on the size dependence of self diffusivity of solutes through detailed molecular dynamics simulations on binary…
Living cells exhibit multi-mode transport that switches between an active, self-propelled motion and a seemingly passive, random motion. Cellular decision-making over transport mode switching is a stochastic process that depends on the…
We model an enclosed system of bacteria, whose motility-induced phase separation is coupled to slow population dynamics. Without noise, the system shows both static phase separation and a limit cycle, in which a rising global population…
In natural environments, solid surfaces present both opportunities and challenges for bacteria. On one hand, they serve as platforms for biofilm formation, crucial for bacterial colonization and resilience in harsh conditions. On the other…
Microbiology is the science of microbes, particularly bacteria. Many bacteria are motile: they are capable of self-propulsion. Among these, a significant class execute so-called run-and-tumble motion: they follow a fairly straight path for…