Abstract
Contact inhibition is a cell property that limits the migration and proliferation of cells in crowded environments. Here we investigate the growth dynamics of a cell colony composed of migrating and proliferating cells on a substrate using a minimal model that incorporates the mechanisms of contact inhibition of locomotion and proliferation. We find two distinct regimes. At early times, when contact inhibition is weak, the colony grows exponentially in time, fully characterised by the proliferation rate. At long times, the colony boundary moves at a constant speed, determined only by the migration speed of a single cell and independent of the proliferation rate. Further, the model demonstrates how cell-cell alignment speeds up colony growth. Our model illuminates how simple local mechanical interactions give rise to contact inhibition, and from this, how cell colony growth is self-organised and controlled on a local level.
Highlights
Contact inhibition is a cell property that limits the migration and proliferation of cells in crowded environments
Essential for the regulation of these processes is contact inhibition of locomotion (CIL), which describes the tendency of cells to stop migration or change direction when coming into contact with other cells[12,13,14,15,16]
We investigated the dynamics of a colony of crawling, proliferating cells with a minimal, mechanical cell model
Summary
Contact inhibition is a cell property that limits the migration and proliferation of cells in crowded environments. Similar growth stages are found in tumour growth dynamics, e.g.50,51 In the former regime, cells are highly mobile and divide frequently, while in the latter, both the motion and proliferation of the cells becomes suppressed, linking the transition to contact inhibition. Such a transition is readily found in simulations if the proliferation rate of cells is locally coupled to density or available space[40,41,44], or stress[37]
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