Researchers at Nano Life Science Institute (WPI-NanoLSI), Kanazawa University, demonstrate how morphogens combined with cell adhesion can generate tissue domains with a sharp boundary in an in vitro model system. Recent advances that have enabled the growth of tissue cultures into organoids and embryoids have heightened interest as to how tissue growth is controlled during the natural processes of embryo development. It is known that the diffusion of signaling molecules called morphogens directs patterned tissue growth but what has been harder to understand is how the gradient of morphogens from this diffusion can lead to sharply defined domains in the resulting tissue.
Now Satoshi Toda at Kanazawa University NanoLSI (currently Osaka University, Institute for Protein Research), alongside Kosuke Mizuno at NanoLSI and Tsuyoshi Hirashima at the National University of Singapore, demonstrate a simple model system – SYnthetic Morphogen system for Pattern Logic Exploration using 3D spheroids (SYMPLE3D) – that sheds light on the process. Various previous studies have looked at the role of morphogens and cell adhesion during tissue growth separately. However, the researchers noted a couple of recent studies indicating how a morphogen involved in neural tube patterning controls expression of a family of adhesion proteins called cadherins to form sharply defined structures.
Prompted by these insights, they devised their model system to investigate the interplay between morphogens an.
