Improving the understanding of cytoneme-mediated morphogen gradients by in silico modeling.
PLoS Comput Biol
; 17(8): e1009245, 2021 08.
Article
em En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-34343167
ABSTRACT
Morphogen gradients are crucial for the development of organisms. The biochemical properties of many morphogens prevent their extracellular free diffusion, indicating the need of an active mechanism for transport. The involvement of filopodial structures (cytonemes) has been proposed for morphogen signaling. Here, we describe an in silico model based on the main general features of cytoneme-meditated gradient formation and its implementation into Cytomorph, an open software tool. We have tested the spatial and temporal adaptability of our model quantifying Hedgehog (Hh) gradient formation in two Drosophila tissues. Cytomorph is able to reproduce the gradient and explain the different scaling between the two epithelia. After experimental validation, we studied the predicted impact of a range of features such as length, size, density, dynamics and contact behavior of cytonemes on Hh morphogen distribution. Our results illustrate Cytomorph as an adaptive tool to test different morphogen gradients and to generate hypotheses that are difficult to study experimentally.
Texto completo:
1
Base de dados:
MEDLINE
Assunto principal:
Modelos Biológicos
/
Morfogênese
Tipo de estudo:
Prognostic_studies
Limite:
Animals
Idioma:
En
Revista:
PLoS Comput Biol
Assunto da revista:
BIOLOGIA
/
INFORMATICA MEDICA
Ano de publicação:
2021
Tipo de documento:
Article
País de afiliação:
Espanha