Coherent modelling switch between pointwise and distributed representations of cell aggregates (Q515830)

The authors consider the set of clones, as aggregates of \(N(t)\) typical particles defined in \(\Omega \subset \mathbb{R}^2\) by the vector \[ X(t)=\{x_1(t),x_2(t),\dots,x_{N(t)}(t),\},\;N(t)\in \mathbb{N} \eqno{(1)} \] with spatial mass density distribution \(\rho(t,y): \mathbb{R}\times \Omega \to \mathbb{R}_+\) such that \[ \int\limits_{\Omega}\rho(t,\mathbf{y})dy=M(t), \; \;\forall t. \eqno{(2)} \] Many additional properties of these clones allow to obtain the system of ODEs (local form of mass balance equation) \[ \frac{dx_j(t)}{dt}=v_L(x_j(t)),\;j=1,\dots,N_L(t), \] \[ \frac{\partial\rho(t,\mathbf{y})}{\partial t}+\nabla\cdot(\rho(t,yv_D(t,y))=\Gamma (t,y), \eqno{(3)} \] where \(x_j\) and \(\rho\) are defined in (1), (2) and \(v_L,\;v_D\) are the velocity of the two cell clones, respectively. Thus the equation (3) represent modeling of clones interaction dynamics -- the model of tumor growth. In conclusion, biologically relevant numerical realizations are presented: they deal with the growth of a tumor spheroid and with the initial differentiation stages of the formation of the zebrafish posterior lateral line. Both phenomena mainly rely on cell phenotypic transition and differentiated behavior, thereby constituting biological systems particularly suitable to assess the advantages of the proposed model.