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In this work we show how a network inspired by a coarse-grained description of actomyosin cytoskeleton can learn - in a contrastive learning framework - from environmental perturbations if it is endowed with mechanosensitive proteins and…
The cytoskeleton protein actin assembles into large bundles when supporting stresses in the cell, but grows into a fine branched network to induce cell motion. Such self-organization processes are studied in artificial networks of…
The actin cortex is a thin layer of actin filaments and myosin motors beneath the outer membrane of animal cells. It determines the cells' mechanical properties and forms important morphological structures. Physical descriptions of the…
The ability of cells to sense and respond to the mechanical properties of their environments is fundamental to a range of cellular behaviours, with substrate stiffness increasingly being found to be a key signalling factor. Although active…
Activity and renewability are distinctive features of living matter, and constitute a new class of materials that we term renewable active matter. A striking example is the cell cytoskeleton, where myosin filaments bind to the actin…
Spatially localised defect structures emerge spontaneously in a hydrodynamic description of an active polar fluid comprising polar 'actin' filaments and 'myosin' motor proteins that (un)bind to filaments and exert active contractile…
Actin and myosin assemble into a thin layer of a highly dynamic network underneath the membrane of eukaryotic cells. This network generates the forces that drive cell and tissue-scale morphogenetic processes. The effective material…
We report the simultaneous characterization of time- and force-dependent mechanical properties of adherent cells in the physiologically relevant regime of large forces. We used magnetic tweezers to apply forces to magnetic beads bound to…
The one-dimensional crawling movement of a cell is considered in this theoretical study. Our active gel model shows that for a cell with weakly mechanosensitive adhesion complexes, as myosin contractility increases, a cell starts to move at…
We analyse a generic motility model, with the motility mechanism arising by contractile stress due to the interaction of myosin and actin. A hydrodynamic active polar gel theory is used to model the cytoplasm of a cell and is combined with…
Cell crawling on flat substrates is based on intracellular flows of the actin cytoskeleton that are driven by both actin polymerization at the front and myosin contractility at the back. The new experimental tool of optogenetics makes it…
An actin filament contacting myosin molecules as a functional unit of muscle contraction induces magnetic dipoles along the filament when ATP molecules to be hydrolyzed are available there. The induced magnetic dipoles are coherent over the…
The crawling motion of Dictyostelium discoideum on substrata involves a number of coordinated events including cell contractions and cell protrusions. The mechanical forces exerted on the substratum during these contractions have recently…
The cell cortex is a thin layer beneath the plasma membrane that gives animal cells mechanical resistance and drives most of their shape changes, from migration, division to multicellular morphogenesis. It is mainly composed of actin…
The actin cytoskeleton of adherent tissue cells often condenses into filament bundles contracted by myosin motors, so-called stress fibers, which play a crucial role in the mechanical interaction of cells with their environment. Stress…
Contractile biopolymer networks, such as the actomyosin meshwork of animal cells, are ubiquitous in living organisms. The active gel theory, which provides the thermodynamic framework for these materials, has been mostly used in conjunction…
The cooperative action of many molecular motors is essential for dynamic processes such as cell motility and mitosis. This action can be studied by using motility assays in which the motion of cytoskeletal filaments over a surface coated…
This work presents the development, analysis and numerical simulations of a biophysical model for 3D cell deformation and movement, which couples biochemical reactions and biomechanical forces. We propose a mechanobiochemical model which…
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…
Bundles of filaments and motors are central to contractility in cells. The classic example is striated muscle, where actomyosin contractility is mediated by highly organized sarcomeres which act as fundamental contractile units. However,…