ReviewNature reviews. Molecular cell biology2021
Programmed and self-organized flow of information during morphogenesis.
Review in Nature reviews. Molecular cell biology, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 150 papers.
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Who cites it
150 citing papers in PubMed, 327 citations in OpenAlex.
- Article
- Spaceborne and spaceborn: Physiological aspects of pregnancy and birth during interplanetary flight.Experimental physiology · 2026Review
- The role of geometry in morphogenesis.Development (Cambridge, England) · 2026Review
- Mechanics of compression-driven morphogenesis.Development (Cambridge, England) · 2026Review
- Hydrostatic pressure shapes and canalizes semicircular canal morphology to ensure vestibular function.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- A Controlled in Silico Benchmark for GNN Prediction of Tissue Dynamics.Research square · 2026Article
- Multi-phase field model reveals internal dissipation is crucial for spontaneous hole formation in cell monolayers.Nature communications · 2026Article
- A natural programmable metamaterial controls 3D curvature of compound eyes.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Novel tissue mechanics-guided cellular flows drive the formation of feather follicles.The EMBO journal · 2026Article
- Mechanochemical bistability as a principle of robust morphogenesis.Mechanobiology in medicine · 2026Article
- Biology Needs Philosophy, But What Philosophy?Bioscience · 2026Review
- Positional information and information flows in dynamic tissues.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Emergent stable tissue shapes from the regulatory feedback between morphogens and cell growth.Journal of theoretical biology · 2026Article
- In vivo screen reveals specific roles of Hippo pathway components in development and regeneration.Life science alliance · 2026Article
- BIOPOINT: A particle-based model for probing nuclear mechanics and cell-ECM interactions via experimentally derived parameters.PLoS computational biology · 2026Article
- Diverse, distinct, and densely packed DNA nanostar droplets.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- Spatial patterning of contractility by a self-organized mechanogen activity gradient underlies Drosophila gastrulation.Nature communications · 2026Article
- An active matter model captures spatial dynamics of actomyosin oscillations in larval epithelial cells duringProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- Evolutionary pathway and genetic mechanisms of fin-to-limb transition in vertebrates.Frontiers in cell and developmental biology · 2026Review
- A self-limiting mechanotransduction feedback loop ensures robust organ formation.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2025Article
90 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
2 authors at 1 institution in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
How the shape of embryos and organs emerges during development is a fundamental question that has fascinated scientists for centuries. Tissue dynamics arise from a small set of cell behaviours, including shape changes, cell contact remodelling, cell migration, cell division and cell extrusion. These behaviours require control over cell mechanics, namely active stresses associated with protrusive, contractile and adhesive forces, and hydrostatic pressure, as well as material properties of cells that dictate how cells respond to active stresses. In this Review, we address how cell mechanics and the associated cell behaviours are robustly organized in space and time during tissue morphogenesis. We first outline how not only gene expression and the resulting biochemical cues, but also mechanics and geometry act as sources of morphogenetic information to ultimately define the time and length scales of the cell behaviours driving morphogenesis. Next, we present two idealized modes of how this information flows - how it is read out and translated into a biological effect - during morphogenesis. The first, akin to a programme, follows deterministic rules and is hierarchical. The second follows the principles of self-organization, which rests on statistical rules characterizing the system's composition and configuration, local interactions and feedback. We discuss the contribution of these two modes to the mechanisms of four very general classes of tissue deformation, namely tissue folding and invagination, tissue flow and extension, tissue hollowing and, finally, tissue branching. Overall, we suggest a conceptual framework for understanding morphogenetic information that encapsulates genetics and biochemistry as well as mechanics and geometry as information modules, and the interplay of deterministic and self-organized mechanisms of their deployment, thereby diverging considerably from the traditional notion that shape is fully encoded and determined by genes.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.