Propagating stress waves during epithelial expansion

Abstract

Coordinated motion of cell monolayers during epithelial wound healing and tissue morphogenesis involves mechanical stress generation. Here we propose a model for the dynamics of epithelial expansion that couples mechanical deformations in the tissue to contractile activity and polarization in the cells. A new ingredient of our model is a feedback between local strain, polarization and contractility that naturally yields a mechanism for viscoelasticity and effective inertia in the cell monolayer. Using a combination of analytical and numerical techniques, we demonstrate that our model quantitatively reproduces many experimental findings [Nat. Phys. 8, 628 (2012)], including the build-up of intercellular stresses, and the existence of traveling mechanical waves guiding the oscillatory monolayer expansion.

8 pages, 6 figures, added references, added more details in the supplementary information

References in corpus (4)

• Generic theory of active polar gels: a paradigm for cytoskeletal dynamics
• Cadherin-Based Intercellular Adhesions Organize Epithelial Cell-Matrix Traction Forces
• Instabilities and Oscillations in Isotropic Active Gels
• Generic phases of cross-linked active gels: Relaxation, Oscillation and Contractility

Cited by in corpus (26)

• Physical Models of Collective Cell Migration
• The statistical physics of active matter: from self-catalytic colloids to living cells
• Active wetting of epithelial tissues
• Selective and Collective Actuation in Active Solids
• Cooperation of dual modes of cell motility promotes epithelial stress relaxation to accelerate wound healing
• Bursts of activity in collective cell migration
• Geometric frustration and solid-solid transitions in model 2D tissue
• Active dynamics of tissue shear flow
• Active nonreciprocal attraction between motile particles in an elastic medium
• Oriented Active Solids
• Vesicles with internal active filaments: self-organized propulsion controls shape, motility, and dynamical response
• Pulsating active matter
• Emergence of epithelial cell density waves
• Contact inhibition of locomotion and mechanical cross-talk between cell-cell and cell-substrate adhesion determines the pattern of junctional tension in epithelial cell aggregates
• Sparse game changers restore collective motion in panicked human crowds
• Cell growth, division and death in cohesive tissues: a thermodynamic approach
• Multiphase Field Model of Cells on a Substrate: From 3D to 2D
• Ciliary flocking and emergent instabilities enable collective agility in a non-neuromuscular animal
• Periodic necking of misfit hyperelastic filaments embedded in a soft matrix
• Interaction of a migrating cell monolayer with a flexible fiber
• On the relationship between velocities, tractions, and intercellular stresses in the migrating epithelial monolayer
• Spontaneous and Induced Oscillations in Confined Epithelia
• Shape and size changes of adherent elastic epithelia
• Mechanochemical feedback drives complex inertial dynamics in active solids
• Collective cell migration without proliferation: density determines cell velocity and wave velocity
• Hydrodynamic instabilities, waves and turbulence in spreading epithelia