Collective Organization and Morphogenesis Driven by Controlled Nematic Alignment in Cell Layers

Francesca Serra, Associate professor, Department of Physics, Chemistry and Pharmacy, University of Southern Denmark (SDU)

Some cell types have a naturally elongated shape and develop spontaneous nematic order. There is increasing evidence that topological defects in the nematic order affect cell dynamics, cell organization and even morphogenetic processes and tissue development. Using micro-topographic guidance, we induce topological defects and distortions in confluent monolayers of 3T3 fibroblasts and C2C12 myoblasts, and characterize the cell organization and dynamics around topological defects. We show how cells tend to migrate towards the center of +1 defects with a behavior that depends on cell-substrate adhesion [1]. We show that collective alignment can also be altered by dynamically changing the Gaussian curvature of the substrate during cell growth.

Once the cells have reached high surface density, we detach the cell layers from the substrates to form thin free-floating sheets. We verify that as cells detach, the nematic order parameter decreases and the layer’s contraction is higher along the nematic director. We use this concept to program Gaussian curvature in the detached fibroblast layers, thus demonstrating the possibility to design the final shape of the cell layers by controlling their initial 2-D alignment [2].

[1] P. Awasthi et al. arXiv preprint doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2511.23380 (2026)
[2] K. Endresen, A. Murali et al. Adv. Mater., doi:10.1002/adma.202522191 (2026)