A Preferred Curvature-Based Continuum Mechanics Framework for Modeling Embryogenesis.

ABSTRACT: Mechanics plays a key role in the development of higher organisms. However, understanding this relationship is complicated by the difficulty of modeling the link between local forces generated at the subcellular level and deformations observed at the tissue and whole-embryo levels. Here we propose an approach first developed for lipid bilayers and cell membranes, in which force-generation by cytoskeletal elements enters a continuum mechanics formulation for the full system in the form of local changes in preferred curvature. This allows us to express and solve the system using only tissue strains. Locations of preferred curvature are simply related to products of gene expression. A solution, in that context, means relaxing the system's mechanical energy to yield global morphogenetic predic

SUBMITTER: Khairy K 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5985003 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature