Poissonian cellular Potts models reveal nonequilibrium kinetics of cell sorting

TL;DR

This paper introduces a novel Poissonian kinetic framework for cellular Potts models, enabling more accurate simulation of cell-sorting dynamics by incorporating physical timescales and nonequilibrium effects, with applications to mouse-embryo development.

Contribution

It presents a new approach that integrates stochastic thermodynamics into cellular Potts models, improving the representation of nonequilibrium cell behaviors.

Findings

Accurately models cell-sorting in mouse embryos.

Separates thermal, relaxation, and active noise effects.

Identifies roles of nonequilibrium processes in cell dynamics.

Abstract

Cellular Potts models are broadly applied across developmental biology and cancer research. We overcome limitations of the traditional approach, which reinterprets a modified Metropolis sampling as ad hoc dynamics, by introducing a physical timescale through Poissonian kinetics and by applying principles of stochastic thermodynamics to separate thermal and relaxation effects from athermal noise and nonconservative forces. Our method accurately describes cell-sorting dynamics in mouse-embryo development and identifies the distinct contributions of nonequilibrium processes, e.g. cell growth and active fluctuations.