QLS guest seminar - 25 October

[Quantitative Life Sciences]

QLS GUEST SEMINAR

Thursday, 25 October 2018 11h00
ICTP, Central Area, 2nd floor, old SISSA building, Via Beirut 2

Speaker:  Maryam Aliee - PULS group, Institut für Theoretische Physik, 
Friedrich-Alexander-Universität, Erlangen, Germany

Title: Establishment of large-scale patterns by short-range interactions 
in biological tissues

Abstract: Biological tissues represent fascinating dynamics leading to 
the formation of structures and patterns at larger scales compared to 
cell size. It is a big challenge to understand how cells communicate 
with each other to coordinate their dynamics and create orders. As an 
example, cells sort out into distinct populations, keeping a sharp 
straight interface between them. On the other side, cells can express 
polarities and the polarity field reveals long distance patterns. In 
this talk, I would like to present physical models to address some 
mechanisms that contribute to establishment of stable patterns. First, 
we will discuss how local interactions of cells at the interface 
influence its shape and mechanics. In the second case, I present 
a theoretical model to describe dynamics of polarity fields. Our model 
generalizes classical spin models by incorporating effective transport 
of polarity molecules between neighboring cells. We study how the 
intercellular transport qualitatively affects dynamics and leads to the 
formation of non-trivial patterns.

Indico: http://indico.ictp.it/event/8774/

-- 
Erica Sarnataro
Group Secretary
Quantitative Life Sciences
The Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics (ICTP)
Trieste,  Italy
Tel. +39-040-2240623
www.ictp.it/research/qls.aspx
e-mail: qls at ictp.it