Emergence of collective propulsion through cell-cell adhesion

Neuraminidase inhibition promotes the collective migration of neurons and recovery of brain function

In the injured brain, new neurons produced from endogenous neural stem cells form chains and migrate to injured areas and contribute to the regeneration of lost neurons. However, this endogenous regenerative capacity of the brain has not yet been leveraged for the treatment of brain injury. Here, we show that in healthy brain chains of migrating new neurons maintain unexpectedly large non-adherent areas between neighboring cells, allowing for efficient migration. In instances of brain injury, neuraminidase reduces polysialic acid levels, which negatively regulates adhesion, leading to increased cell-cell adhesion and reduced migration efficiency. The administration of zanamivir, a neuraminidase inhibitor used for influenza treatment, promotes neuronal migration toward damaged regions, fosters neuronal regeneration, and facilitates functional recovery. Together, these findings shed light on a new mechanism governing efficient neuronal migration in the adult brain under physiological conditions, pinpoint the disruption of this mechanism during brain injury, and propose a promising therapeutic avenue for brain injury through drug repositioning.

Dynamic Self-Organization of Idealized Migrating Cells by Contact Communication

This Letter investigates what forms of cellular dynamic self-organization are caused through intercellular contact communication based on a theoretical model in which migrating cells perform contact following and contact inhibition and attraction of locomotion. Tuning those strengths causes varieties of dynamic patterns. This further includes a novel form of collective migration, snakelike dynamic assembly. Scrutinizing this pattern reveals that cells in this state can accurately respond to an external directional cue but have no spontaneous global polar order.

Adhesion-stabilizing long-distance transport of cells on tissue surface

The stable transport of migrating eukaryotic cells is essential in organ development and repair processes. However, the mechanism that preserves transport stability over long distances in organs is not fully understood. As the driving mechanism of cell migration, the expressions of heterophilic cell-cell adhesion between moving cells and scaffolding tissue have been observed in such transport. In this paper, we theoretically investigate this heterophilic adhesion, which is persistently polarized in the migrating cell, as a possible transport stabilization mechanism. The adhesion was examined on the basis of the cellular Potts model, and our results confirm the stabilization of the transport to be an effect of the persistence.