The Morpho-Kinetic Landscape of Macrophage Modes During Wound Healing in Zebrafish

TL;DR

This study introduces a quantitative workflow to analyze macrophage behaviors during zebrafish wound healing, revealing distinct morpho-kinetic patterns of different activation states and their transition dynamics.

Contribution

It presents a novel analytic method to classify macrophage activation states based on morpho-kinetic features in vivo during wound healing.

Findings

M1 and M2 macrophages show distinct shape and movement behaviors.

The workflow enables estimation of the timing of macrophage phenotypic switches.

TNF-negative macrophages are located farther from the wound.

Abstract

Macrophages play an essential role in wound healing due to their dynamic nature and functional plasticity, exhibiting highly heterogeneous morpho-kinetic behaviors depending on their activation states. However, quantitative analysis of macrophage behavior in in vivo settings remains limited, largely due to the complexity of their diverse morphologies and motility patterns over time. In this study, we present an analytic workflow to investigate macrophage dynamics in zebrafish. By computing a comprehensive set of morpho-kinetic features, we observe that M1 (pro-inflammatory) and M2 (anti-inflammatory) macrophages exhibit distinct behaviors, such as reduced shape elongation, more directed movement, and less random-like motion in M1 compared to M2 macrophages. Based on these features, we classify macrophages in the transition period into M1-like and M2-like groups. We compare and analyze their behaviors, which allows us to estimate the timing of the phenotypic switch. In addition, macrophages not expressing Tumor Necrosis Factor (TNF) are located significantly farther from the wound compared to M1 macrophages. While macrophages unstimulated by wound signaling exhibit some M2-like features, they differ notably in shape elongation and migration speed. In summary, this study provides a quantitative analysis of macrophage behavior during wound healing and suggests distinct behavioral landscapes across different macrophage activation states.