Thrilled to share our new preprint on detecting the nematic orientation field on surfaces of 3D multicellular systems! Huge thanks to all authors: @tobyandrews, Joe Pollard, @_Priya_R, Alpha Yap & @R_G_Morris ! Any 3D system?

RT @ClaireLeclech: Our latest study on nuclear deformations in microgrooves is finally out! All you need to know be…

RT @ClaireDessalles: Today is a very special day for me: I just started as a permanent CNRS researcher at the Institute of Light and Matter…

RT @TheoBiophysics: 🚨NEWS! We are organising a new monthly event: The Young Biophysicists Virtual Meetings where early career research…

RT @ItaiYanai: Doing science is mostly just realizing that what you initially lack in expertise, you can more than make up for with excitem…

@AR_AbdelFattah @tobyandrews @_Priya_R @R_G_Morris Thank you Abdel !

@dubey837 @tobyandrews @_Priya_R @R_G_Morris Thanks Sushil 🙂

RT @softlivmat_fc: L. A. Hoffmann, L. Giomi, Homochirality in the Vicsek model: Fluctuations and potential implications for cellular flocks…

Thanks for following along! Are you interested in analyzing your system? Once published, we will make the user-friendly analysis code available on GitHub! Or are you interested in a collaboration? Please DM.

By selecting data points, we can compare properties such as alignment of cells between different regions (Region I: outer curvature, Region II: axes) in the heart & between different developmental stages (72 hpf, 120 hpf). Region I: high alignment -> in direction of tension?

Spheroids are simple systems with only convex curvature. What about more complex systems? We teamed up with @tobyandrews & @_Priya_R, and analyzed the ventricular myocardium of Zebrafish hearts ... and it works! 👇 (Directors: high alignment = red, misaligned = blue)

As expected, our spherical aggregates have a total topological charge of +2. We show that the number of defects correlates with the surface area, as previously reported in the theoretical literature, for example by Henkes et al, 2020. 👉 Experiment verifies theory

Nematic directors align with cell orientation & spheroid surface, highlighting a big difference compared to 2D intensity projections of multiple image planes. Our method allows not only the generation of the orientation field, but also the calculation of topological defects.

Yes, but how? We developed an analysis pipeline that slices the outer layer of the cell system via tangent planes and analyzes properties of these 2D-generated images. The center information, where the region is approximately flat, is then transferred back to the 3D surface.

📢Postdoc Opening!📢 Interested in studying the mechanisms of epithelial homeostasis? We have 2 open #postdoc positions in the lab of Alpha Yap @IMBatUQ in Brisbane, Australia 🦘🇦🇺. See details below 👇 Please RT!

RT @biorxiv_biophys: Capturing Nematic Order on Tissue Surfaces of Arbitrary Geometry #biorxiv_biophys

RT @softlivmat_fc: A. Murali, P. Awasthi, K. Endresen, A. Goszczak, F. Serra, Cells around the corner. arXiv [cond-mat.soft] (2025). https:…