PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Sourabh Bhide
AU  - Denisa Gombalova
AU  - Gregor Mönke
AU  - Johannes Stegmaier
AU  - Valentyna Zinchenko
AU  - Anna Kreshuk
AU  - Julio M Belmonte
AU  - Maria Leptin
TI  - Mechanical competition alters the cellular interpretation of an endogenous genetic programme
AID  - 10.1101/2020.10.15.333963
DP  - 2020 Jan 01
TA  - bioRxiv
PG  - 2020.10.15.333963
4099  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2020/10/25/2020.10.15.333963.short
4100  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2020/10/25/2020.10.15.333963.full
AB  - The intrinsic genetic programme of a cell is not sufficient to explain all of the cell’s activities. External mechanical stimuli are increasingly recognized as determinants of cell behaviour. In the epithelial folding event that constitutes the beginning of gastrulation in Drosophila, the genetic programme of the future mesoderm leads to the establishment of a contractile actomyosin network that triggers apical constriction of cells, and thereby, tissue folding. However, some cells do not constrict but instead stretch, even though they share the same genetic programme as their constricting neighbours. We show here that tissue-wide interactions force these cells to expand even when an otherwise sufficient amount of apical, active actomyosin is present. Models based on contractile forces and linear stress-strain responses do not reproduce experimental observations, but simulations in which cells behave as ductile materials with non-linear mechanical properties do. Our models show that this behaviour is a general emergent property of actomyosin networks [in a supracellular context, in accordance with our experimental observations of actin reorganisation within stretching cells.Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest.