Dresden 2020 – scientific programme

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BP: Fachverband Biologische Physik

BP 1: Active Matter I (joint session BP/CPP/DY)

BP 1.6: Talk

Monday, March 16, 2020, 11:30–11:45, HÜL 386

Synthetic minimal active cilia — •Isabella Guido — Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Organization, Goettigen, Germany

Cilia and flagella are microtubule based filamentous organelles that protrude into the extracellular environment from the surface of many cells for promoting fluid transport or propelling organisms in fluids by producing rhythmic bending waves. The main contribution to their beating is due to motor proteins that drive sliding of the microtubule doublets. However, the fundamental mechanism of the motor-microtubule interaction is still a puzzle. Here we present a synthetic minimal active cilium, a two-filaments system, in which the beat is initiated by a buckling instability in one of the filaments. The system presents continuous beating through association and dissociation cycles, similar to the sliding of a pair of doublet microtubules observed in a Chlamydomonas flagellum. The analysis of the conformational dynamics gives us a quantification of dynein force, motor density and bending energy. We develop a theoretical model to study the dynamics of active elastic filaments induced by internal force in which the attachment and detachment kinetics of motors play as important a role as their force generation. The active stroke of the synthetic cilium occurs due to a buckling instability between two clamped filaments, while the recovery stroke follows a "catastrophic failure" of the bound motors.

This work is in collaboration with Prof. Ramin Golestanian and Dr. Andrej Vilfan.