Motility induced phase separation of deformable cells

Abstract

Using a multi-phase field model, we examine how particle deformability, which is a proxy for cell stiffness, affects motility induced phase separation (MIPS). We show that purely repulsive deformable, i.e., squishy, cells phase separate more effectively than their rigid counterparts. This can be understood as due to the fact that deformability increases the effective duration of collisions. In addition, the dense regions become increasingly disordered as deformability increases. Our results contextualize the applicability of MIPS to biological systems and have implications for how cells in biological systems may self-organize

7 pages, 6 figures

References in corpus (6)

• Novel type of phase transition in a system of self-driven particles
• Motility-Induced Phase Separation
• Statistical Mechanics of Interacting Run-and-Tumble Bacteria
• Collective motion of self-propelled particles interacting without cohesion
• Pattern formation in self-propelled particles with density-dependent motility
• Effective Interactions in Active Brownian Suspensions

Cited by in corpus (5)

• Intercellular Friction and Motility Drive Orientational Order in Cell Monolayers
• Dynamic Clustering of Active Rings
• Multiphase Field Model of Cells on a Substrate: From 3D to 2D
• Active wetting transitions induced by rotational noise at solid interfaces
• Percolation transitions in the binary mixture of active Brownian particles with different softness