Regensburg 2004 – scientific programme

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AKB: Biologische Physik

AKB 50: Poster Session "Biological Physics"

AKB 50.64: Poster

Friday, March 12, 2004, 10:30–13:00, B

Continuum theory of filamental self-organization — •Alexander Zumdieck, Karsten Kruse, and Frank Jülicher — Max-Planck-Institut für Physik komplexer Systeme

The cytoskeleton is a dynamic complex network of protein filaments which is involved in many active cellular processes. The polymerization and depolymerization of filaments as well as the interaction with other proteins such as molecular motors induce mechanical stresses and dynamic processes in these structures.Linear filament bundles are important substructures of the cytoskeleton.

We discuss a general continuum description of the dynamics of such active networks[1] and focus on one-dimensional bundle geometries. We show that polymerization and depolymerization play a key role for the dynamic properties of a bundle, they for example introduce a new length scale in the system which governs instabilities leading to inhomogenous states. We relate this continuum theory to a more microscopic description of active filament systems and show that de-/polymerization could play a similar role as motors for bundle dynamics. The continuum description can also be applied to higher dimensional filament geometries that are for example relevant to the formation of filament rings on cell surfaces.

[1] K. Kruse, A. Zumdieck and F. Jülicher, Europhys. Lett. 64, 716 (2003)