A white blood cell chasing a pathogen and a cancer cell breaking away from a tumour are both performing the same physical feat: changing shape to move. This project aims to understand the fundamental mechanics behind that shape change. While scientists have identified many of the molecules involved in cell shape control, they lack a physical understanding of how those molecules generate the forces that actually deform the cell. This gap has stalled progress in explaining both healthy movements—like immune cell tracking—and pathological ones, such as the metastasis that spreads cancer. The researchers will combine physics and biology to bridge that gap, asking how molecular interactions determine a cell’s physical properties and, in turn, its shape. This is fundamental science with no immediate clinical application. However, a deeper physical model of cell shape could eventually underpin new strategies for stopping cancer cell migration or enhancing immune cell mobility, much as understanding the physics of blood flow transformed cardiovascular medicine.
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We investigate the fundamental mechanisms by which animal cells control their shape. A proper control of cell shape is key to the life of an organism. From the earliest stages of embryonic development, cells deform to divide and form new cells, and to organise into tissues. Later in life, precisely controlled cell shape changes are essential for cell movements. For instance during immune response, white blood cells move to track and kill pathogens. Improper control of cell morphology is at the heart of many diseases. For example, cancer dissemination is caused by uncontrolled cell movements, with cancer cells migrating away from the primary tumour to form metastases in other parts of the body. Recent advances have uncovered many of the molecules involved in cell shape control. However, the shape of any object, dead or alive, is ultimately determined by mechanical forces. Therefore, physical considerations are of key importance to understand cell shape. Progress in understanding cell shape changes, in health and disease, has been stalled by the scarcity of interdisciplinary studies. We combine physics and biology to investigate how cells control their own morphology. Our aim is to understand how molecular interactions determine the physical properties of the cell, and how these properties control cell shape. Bridging physics and biology will help understand how the dramatic changes in shape associated with healthy and pathological cell movements are controlled.
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