Home

Research Interests

My research interests are mainly in continuum mechanics, biomechanics, and mathematical biology; more specifically, in the interplay between the cell-to-cell signalling, the biomechanical behaviour, and gene expression in tissues.

Past Work: Models of Epidermal Wound Repair

For my Ph.D., I worked on biomechanical models of epidermal wound repair in embryos. The mechanism of epidermal wound recovery in embryos is found to be substantially different from that in adults. In adults, wound recovery is accomplished by the migration of fibroblasts into the wound region. The fibroblasts secrete collagen and restore the missing tissue. In embryos, on the other hand, epidermal wounds seem to recover by means of a contracting "purse-string" which surrounds the wound and consists of actin filaments aligned in a certain way. James Murray and his collaborators constructed a static model, a BVP in nonlinear elasticity, capturing the moment when the edges of the wound have stopped retracting (because the "purse-string" has just formed) and are in a state of quasi-equilibrium. I revised the above static model for a simpler one, and then constructed a dynamic elasto-theoretic (biomechanical) model that describes the wound recovery process subsequent to the Murray quasi-equilibrium. The crucial part of the model is to postulate a relation between the appropriate types of cell-to-cell signals and the mechanical response of the actin filaments to those signals.

To see an AVI movie depicting the healing of a circular wound as predicted by my dynamic model, click here. To see a PDF image depicting the healing of an elliptically-shaped wound as predicted by my dynamic model, and juxtaposed with photographic data (Hutson et. al., Science 300, 145-149, 2003) on the closure of the dorsal opening in Drosophila, click here.

My dissertation: (PS, PDF)

Current Work

(For a list of my publications, see my CV.)

Home