Dresden 2026 – wissenschaftliches Programm
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BP: Fachverband Biologische Physik
BP 27: Cell Mechanics I
BP 27.2: Vortrag
Donnerstag, 12. März 2026, 10:00–10:15, BAR/0205
Mechanical polarity in cell migration — •Steffen Grosser1, Leone Rossetti2, Isabela Corina Fortunato3, Ricard Alert4,5, and Xavier Trepat1,5,6,7 — 1Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC), Barcelona — 2Faculty of Dentistry, Oral & Craniofacial Sciences, King's College, London — 3Institut d'Investigació Sanitària Illes Balears (IdISBa), Palma — 4MPI für Physik komplexer Systeme (MPI-PKS), Dresden — 5University of Barcelona, Barcelona — 6ICREA, Barcelona — 7CIBER-BBN, Barcelona
Cells migrate on substrates in the absence of any net force, which poses a fundamental challenge in cell dynamics. All forces transmitted from the cells to the substrate cancel out. Neither force magnitude nor force dipole are related to neither cell speed nor direction.
We have recently found, however, that a higher moment of the cell traction distribution, the quadrupole, is in fact closely related to cell velocity - to both speed and direction. The quadrupole characterizes the asymmetry of the traction distribution, even when the total net force cancels out. It can be thought of as a mechanical cell polarity readout. Experimentally, the relation between force asymmetry and velocity holds for single cells and for short multicellular trains, and even for cells moving along gradients of adhesion.
To interpret this traction asymmetry, we propose to decompose the force into an active, unbalanced part that drives cell motion, and a frictional component. This leads to a novel, actual force-velocity relation for cell dynamics.
Keywords: Migration; Polarity; Traction; Optogenetics