Substrate rigidity deforms and polarizes active gels

TL;DR

This paper introduces a continuum model of active gels representing cells, showing how substrate stiffness influences cell deformation and polarization through boundary conditions that couple the cell's stress and deformation fields.

Contribution

It develops a novel continuum model linking substrate stiffness to cell deformation and polarization, incorporating active gel theory with boundary conditions.

Findings

Substrate stiffness affects cell deformation and polarization.

Active stresses lead to inhomogeneous cell deformations.

Coupling enhances cell polarization and symmetry breaking.

Abstract

We present a continuum model of the coupling between cells and substrate that accounts for some of the observed substrate-stiffness dependence of cell properties. The cell is modeled as an elastic active gel, adapting recently developed continuum theories of active viscoelastic fluids. The coupling to the substrate enters as a boundary condition that relates the cell's deformation field to local stress gradients. In the presence of activity, the coupling to the substrate yields spatially inhomogeneous contractile stresses and deformations in the cell and can enhance polarization, breaking the cell's front-rear symmetry.