Spatial fluctuations at vertices of epithelial layers: quantification of regulation by Rho pathway

TL;DR

This study links biochemical Rho pathway regulation to spatial fluctuations in epithelial tissues by analyzing vertex displacements, revealing how signaling layers influence tissue dynamics.

Contribution

It introduces a phenomenological model to quantify how Rho pathway components control epithelial vertex fluctuations, bridging biochemical signaling and tissue mechanics.

Findings

Rho pathway activity modulates vertex fluctuation dynamics

Correlation between signaling layers and spatial fluctuations identified

Quantitative measures of tissue activity such as diffusion coefficient obtained

Abstract

In living matter, shape fluctuations induced by acto-myosin are usually studied in vitro via reconstituted gels, whose properties are controlled by changing the concentrations of actin, myosin and cross-linkers. Such an approach deliberately avoids to consider the complexity of biochemical signaling inherent to living systems. Acto-myosin activity inside living cells is mainly regulated by the Rho signaling pathway which is composed of multiple layers of coupled activators and inhibitors. We investigate how such a pathway controls the dynamics of confluent epithelial tissues by tracking the displacements of the junction points between cells. Using a phenomenological model to analyze the vertex fluctuations, we rationalize the effects of different Rho signaling targets on the emergent tissue activity by quantifying the effective diffusion coefficient, the persistence time and persistence length of the fluctuations. Our results reveal an unanticipated correlation between layers of activation/inhibition and spatial fluctuations within tissues. Overall, this work connects the regulation via biochemical signaling with mesoscopic spatial fluctuations, with potential application to the study of structural rearrangements in epithelial tissues.