A dynamically diluted alignment model reveals the impact of cell turnover on the plasticity of tissue polarity patterns

Research output: Contribution to journalResearch articleContributedpeer-review

Contributors

Abstract

The polarization of cells and tissues is fundamental for tissue morphogenesis during biological development and regeneration. A deeper understanding of biological polarity pattern formation can be gained from the consideration of pattern reorganization in response to an opposing instructive cue, which we here consider using the example of experimentally inducible body axis inversions in planarian flatworms. We define a dynamically diluted alignment model linking three processes: entrainment of cell polarity by a global signal, local cell–cell coupling aligning polarity among neighbours, and cell turnover replacing polarized cells by initially unpolarized cells. We show that a persistent global orienting signal determines the final mean polarity orientation in this stochastic model. Combining numerical and analytical approaches, we find that neighbour coupling retards polarity pattern reorganization, whereas cell turnover accelerates it. We derive a formula for an effective neighbour coupling strength integrating both effects and find that the time of polarity reorganization depends linearly on this effective parameter and no abrupt transitions are observed. This allows us to determine neighbour coupling strengths from experimental observations. Our model is related to a dynamic 8-Potts model with annealed site-dilution and makes testable predictions regarding the polarization of dynamic systems, such as the planarian epithelium.

Details

Original languageEnglish
Article number20170466
Pages (from-to)1579-1587
Number of pages9
JournalJournal of the Royal Society Interface
Volume14
Issue number135
Publication statusPublished - 2017
Peer-reviewedYes

External IDs

Scopus 85033213027
ORCID /0000-0003-0137-5106/work/142244209

Keywords

Keywords

  • mathematical biology, mean-field analysis, Planarians, planar cell polarity, Interacting Particle Systems, Regeneration