Research
Biological systems such as cells and tissues generate, sense and respond to physical forces. How biological systems adapt to physical forces critically determine processes such as embryo development and tumor growth. We aim to use computational and theoretical methods grounded in physics to understand collective cell behaviors in the following biological contexts:
01 — Cell movement and growth in three dimensional cell collectives
We have witnessed significant progress into the research and our knowledge of three dimensional (3D) cell cultures as systems that better capture physiological cell behaviors.
Here are some of the questions that we are interested in answering:
How do cells detect and respond to forces and stresses from other cells in dense 3D cell collectives ?
How does cell-to-cell forces impact cell movement and spatial organization in order to facilitate processes such as tumor invasion and embryo development?
Proposed Impact:
Gather insights into cell behaviors that closely mimic cells in living organisms.
Better understand the physical and mechanical factors contributing to tumor invasion and metastasis.
Related work: https://journals.aps.org/prx/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevX.8.021025 Phys. Rev. X(2018)
02 — Physics of vertebrate embryo axis elongation
At the very initial stages of development embryos resemble a ball of cells and are roughly spherical in shape. At later stages embryos elongate along an axis to form the head and tail. Together with our experimental collaborators we investigate a particular type of collective cell movement called convergent extension which is known to be essential for embryo elongation.
In this work, we are interested in quantifying the motion of cells and how this motion is influenced by mechanical heterogeneity (i.e. spatial variations in the mechanical properties) of cell-cell junctions.
Questions of interest:
What is the role of glassy vs fluid-like cell motion during convergent extension?
How can we discern the relation between cellular level molecular factors to physical and mechanical properties of cells?
Related work: https://elifesciences.org/articles/65390 eLife (2021).
03 — Directed collective cell migration due to mechanical and electrical cues
Directed migration of a collection of cells is crucial during various embryo developmental processes as well as disease states such as tumor metastasis. In close collaboration with experimentalists we aim to study how biophysical cues such as mechanical factors and electric fields aid directed movement of cell collectives.
Questions of interest:
How do collective cells migrate in a directional manner in electric fields?
How do cells navigate simultaneous multi-factor variations in biophysical cues known to affect directed migration of cells (e.g: mechanical and electrical).
Related work: https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.08.12.456059v1