Berlin 2012 – scientific programme

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BP: Fachverband Biologische Physik

BP 27: Posters: Cytoskeletal Filaments

BP 27.8: Poster

Thursday, March 29, 2012, 17:30–19:30, Poster A

The role of fluctuations in cytoskeletal wave formation — •Florimond Collette, Marc Neef, and Karsten Kruse — Theoretische Physik, Universität des Saarlandes, Postfach 151150, 66041 Saarbrücken, Germany

Spontaneous cytoskeletal waves have been reported in a number of different cell types and under various conditions. Actin waves observed in the slime mold Dictyostelium discoideum [1] and in human neutrophils [2] presumably originate from similar mechanisms: Proteins nucleating actin filaments get activated on the membrane, generate new filaments, and are in turn inactivated by actin filaments through an unknow mechanism. We extend a meanfield description of this system [3] to consider stochastic effects in the dynamics of filament nucleators and solve the equation numericaly. When varying the number of nucleators, we observe bifurcations of stationary states into travelling waves. In the case of travelling waves, we find spontaneous switching between waves moving into opposite directions.

[1] T. Bretschneider, et al., Curr. Biol. 14, 1 (2004).

[2] O. D. Weiner, et al., PLoS Biology 5, e221 (2007).

[3] K. Doubrovinski and K. Kruse, EPL 83, 18003 (2008).