NIMBioS Seminar Series

In conjunction with the interdisciplinary activities of the National Institute for Mathematical and Biological Synthesis (NIMBioS), a seminar series on topics in mathematical biology will be hosted at NIMBioS every other Tuesday at 3:30 p.m. (unless otherwise noted) in the Hallam Auditorium, Room 206, Claxton Building, 1122 Volunteer Blvd. Seminar speakers will focus on their research initiatives at the interface of mathematics and many areas of the life sciences. Light refreshments will be served in Room 206 beginning 30 minutes before each talk. Faculty and students from across the UT community are welcome to join us.

Time/Date: Wednesday, April 30, 2014, 3:30 p.m.*
Location: Room 206, Claxton Building, 1122 Volunteer Blvd.
Speaker: Dr. Leah Edelstein-Keshet, Mathematics, Univ. of British Columbia, and NIMBioS Postdoctoral Fellows Invited Distinguished Visitor
Topic: Modeling Chemical Patterns in Cell Motility
Abstract: In order to fight infection or heal wounds, mammalian cells such as white blood cells (neutrophils or macrophages) crawl in response to chemical signals, a process termed chemotaxis. To do so, they rearrange their internal structure (actin cytoskeleton) to become polarized. Then the front protrudes and the rear retracts to produce motility. How is this process coordinated? Regulating this process are proteins (small GTPases) that form a chemical "prepattern" inside the cell. Interactions and crosstalk between these proteins results in the spontaneous self-organization of the intracellular patterns, and thence the polarization and motility. In this seminar I will describe modeling work in my group that addresses this topic in a sequence of models of various levels of detail. I will also present some computational techniques for understanding what the models predict and examples of work with experimental colleagues to validate the models.

*Join us for refreshments at 3 p.m. in Room 206.

Seminar Flyer (pdf)

NIMBioS seminars are available for viewing via live streaming during the talk and are archived for later viewing on NIMBioS' YouTube channel.

Watch seminar online.

For more information about this and other NIMBioS Seminars, visit /seminars.

NIMBioS
1122 Volunteer Blvd., Suite 106
University of Tennessee
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From 2008 until early 2021, NIMBioS was supported by the National Science Foundation through NSF Award #DBI-1300426, with additional support from The University of Tennessee, Knoxville. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.