Regensburg 2013 – scientific programme
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BP: Fachverband Biologische Physik
BP 25: Posters: Cytoskeleton
BP 25.2: Poster
Wednesday, March 13, 2013, 17:30–19:30, Poster C
A phase-field model for amoeboid motility — •Alexander Dreher1, Igor Aronson2,3, and Karsten Kruse1 — 1Theoretische Physik, Universität des Saarlandes, Postfach 151150, D-66041 Saar- brücken, Germany — 2Materials Science Division, Argonne National Laboratory, 9700 S. Cass Avenue, Argonne, IL 60439, USA — 3Engineering Sciences and Applied Mathematics, Northwestern University, 21345 Sheridan Road, Evanston, IL 60202, USA
The crawling of eukaryotic cells on substrates is driven by the cytoskeleton. How the cytoskeleton is organized in this process is still poorly understood. It has been suggested that spontaneous polymerization waves provide a possible answer to this question. We examine this possibility theoretically by analyzing a system of treadmilling filaments in presence of nucleating proteins. A challenge arises from the need to describe a moving deformable cell boundary. In this minimal system we treat the cell shape by a phase-field approach. We find spiral waves as well as self-sustained motion of the cell in agreement with experiments on amoeboid motility.