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leaD reSearcher
Trepat Guixer, Xavier
Fundación Instituto de Bioingeniería de Cataluña Instituto de Bioingeniería de Cataluña
Edifici Administració
C/ Baldiri Reixac, 10-12, 2a pl. 08028 Barcelona
(+34) 93 402 02 65 [email protected] group Website
GROUP MEMBERS
Staff members: Sunyer Borrell, Raimón
Associated members: Brugues Ferre, Agustí | Casares García, Laura | Castro Morán, Natalia | Conte, Vito | García, Simón | Laberdiane, Anna | Pérez González, Carlos | Rodríguez Francos, Pilar | Uroz Marimón, Marina | Valon, Leo | Vincent, Romaric | Zalvidea, Dobryna
Main lines of research
• Making cellular forces visible
To study cell and tissue dynamics we develop new technologies to measure physical forces at the cell-cell and cell-matrix interface. By combining these technologies with computational analysis of cell shape and velocity we obtain a full experimental characterization of epithelial dynamics during tissue growth, wound healing and cancer cell invasion.
• Cellular guidance by mechanical cues
Directed cell migration is one of the earliest observations in cell biology, dating back to the late XIX century. Also known as taxis, directed cell migration has been commonly associated with chemotaxis, i.e. the ability of a broad variety of cell types to migrate following gradients of chemical factors. We recently demonstrated a new mode of collective cell guidance by mechanical cues, called collective durotaxis. This new migration mode emerges only in cell collectives and, strikingly, does not require isolated cells to exhibit gradient sensing.
• Microfabrication and wound healing
Using microfabrication technologies, we designed new ways to decipher the mechanisms of wound healing. By doing so we uncovered a new understanding of how cells move and work together to close a gap in a tissue. We showed that a new mechanism applies in which cells assemble supracellular contractile arcs that compress the tissue under the wound. By combining experiments and computational modeling, we showed that contractions arising from these arcs make the wound heal in a quicker and more robust way.
• Fracking epithelial layers
Epithelial sheets must be malleable enough to adopt functional shapes during morphogenesis and to quickly self-repair after damage. Yet, they must be resilient enough to ensure organ compartmentalization and to protect organisms against environmental pathogens. To study the
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PROGRAMMES
Biomaterials & Advanced Therapies