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Turingâ s theory for morphogenesis: past, present and future

Banff International Research Station for Mathematical Innovation and Discovery

Turingâ s famous theory for explaining embryonic pattern formation, laid out in his seminal study ``The chemical basis of morphogenesis'', remains a cornerstone of theoretical biology and has inspired enormous interest, both from theoretical and experimental communities. Despite a number of ups and downs along the way, technical advances coupled to the increased collaboration between experimentalists and theoreticians has led to a number of convincing cases in which Turingâ s idea may play a key role. In this talk I will recount some key milestones in the history of this theory and describe how it is clarifying our understanding of development in a number of processes, using our exploration of feather bud morphogenesis as a principal case study. Yet Turingâ s paper opens with the disclaimer that ``This model will be a simplification and an idealization, and consequently a falsification.'' I will therefore also describe how recent results are pointing the way towards exciting new extensions and directions for Turingâ s theory, particularly as links emerge between chemical-based and mechanical/cell motility based mechanisms for generating tissue pattern formation.

Mathematics; Biology and other natural sciences; Partial differential equations; Mathematical biology

video/mp4

Author affiliation: Heriot-Watt University

2020-09-08

Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International

http://hdl.handle.net/2429/75891

Unreviewed

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/