One-dimensional cell crawling patterns induced by mechanosensitive adhesion complexes

Hsuan-Yi Chen^1,2*, Jen-Yu Lo¹, Yuan-Heng Tseng¹

¹Physics, National Central University, Taoyuan, Taiwan
²Physics, Academis Sinica, Taipei, Taiwan

* Presenter:Hsuan-Yi Chen, email:hschen@phy.ncu.edu.tw

This presentation reports a theoretical study the one-dimensional crawling movement of a cell.
An active gel model and a simplied dynamical system model are constructed,
Both models show that a moving cell with weakly mechanosensitive adhesion complexes has a constant velocity.
As the mechanosensitivity of the adhesion complexes increases, a cell can exhibit stick-slip motion, and eventually periodic back-and-forth migration.
The simplified models further show that the evolution of either the first moment of the myosin density distribution, the length of the cell, and the number of adhesion complexes at both cell ends;
or the dipole and quadrupole moments of traction force, and the number of adhesion complexes at both cell ends are sufficient to generate these complex moving patterns.
These results suggest a close relation between the complex behaviors observed in the experiments on cells crawling along a one-dimensional track, and the interplay between the
distribution of a few key parameters in the cell.

Keywords: Cell movement, Biophysics, Nonlinear dynamics, Active matters