Anomalous diffusion and q-Weibull velocity distributions in epithelial cell migration

• Published in: PloS one Vol. 12; no. 7; p. e0180777
• Main Authors: Souza Vilela Podestá, Tatiane, Venzel Rosembach, Tiago, Aparecida Dos Santos, Anésia, Lobato Martins, Marcelo
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Public Library of Science 10.07.2017; Public Library of Science (PLoS)
• Subjects: Animals; Artificial tissues; Assaying; Biology and Life Sciences; Biotechnology; Cell adhesion & migration; Cell Line, Tumor; Cell migration; Cell Migration Assays; Cell Movement - physiology; Chemokines; Clusters; Computer simulation; Correlation; Density; Diffusion; Diffusion rate; Displacement; Dogs; Epithelial Cells - cytology; Epithelial Cells - physiology; Fluctuations; Healing; Immunosurveillance; Leukocyte migration; Madin Darby Canine Kidney Cells; Maxwellian distribution; Medicine and Health Sciences; Mice; Microscopy; Models, Theoretical; Motility; Organs; Phase transitions; Physical Sciences; Plastics; Random walk; Research and Analysis Methods; Scaling; Spatial distribution; Statistical Distributions; Time series; Time-Lapse Imaging; Tissues; Velocity; Wound healing; Wound Healing - physiology; Brazil
• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0180777
• ISSN: 1932-6203

In multicellular organisms, cell motility is central in all morphogenetic processes, tissue maintenance, wound healing and immune surveillance. Hence, the control of cell motion is a major demand in the creation of artificial tissues and organs. Here, cell migration assays on plastic 2D surfaces involving normal (MDCK) and tumoral (B16F10) epithelial cell lines were performed varying the initial density of plated cells. Through time-lapse microscopy quantities such as speed distributions, velocity autocorrelations and spatial correlations, as well as the scaling of mean-squared displacements were determined. We find that these cells exhibit anomalous diffusion with q-Weibull speed distributions that evolves non-monotonically to a Maxwellian distribution as the initial density of plated cells increases. Although short-ranged spatial velocity correlations mark the formation of small cell clusters, the emergence of collective motion was not observed. Finally, simulational results from a correlated random walk and the Vicsek model of collective dynamics evidence that fluctuations in cell velocity orientations are sufficient to produce q-Weibull speed distributions seen in our migration assays.