TY  - GEN
N2  - Biological cells generate mechanical forces to sense and interact with neighboring cells and the extracellular environment. In this thesis, I combine traction force microscopy, viscoelastic continuum models, finite element simulations and homogenization techniques to demonstrate how contractility on the cellular level emerges from the force-generating actomyosin cytoskeleton. These theoretical approaches are complemented by a series of collaborations with experimental groups that investigate the actomyosin system in different biological systems. For stress fibers, we find a transition from elastic to fluid behavior at a typical timescale of tens of minutes. For small yet strong spreading platelets, we estimate intracellular stresses in the kilopascal range. For epithelial monolayers, I show that the propagation of mechanical forces defines the territories for leader cell formation. Homogenization is used to demonstrate how intracellular polarization determines traction forces, and that stress fibers are characterized by negative compressibility, a property which defines mechanical metamaterials.
Y1  - 2019///
A1  - Probst, Dimitri
TI  - Continuum Modeling of Cell Contractility
AV  - public
ID  - heidok25143
UR  - https://archiv.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/volltextserver/25143/
ER  -