Intracellular Turing Patterns
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| Global IP Fellows Meeting |
Silvina Ponce Dawson
Departamento de Fisica, FCEN-UBA, Ciudad Universitaria, Pabellon I
Intracellular Turing Patterns
Concentration gradients inside cells are involved in key processes
such as cell division and morphogenesis. In this talk I show that a
model of the enzymatic step catalized by phosphofructokinase (PFK),
which is responsible for the homogeneous oscillations observed in the
glycolytic pathway, displays Turing patterns with an intrinsic
length-scale that is smaller than a typical cell size. All the
parameter values are fully consistent with classic experiments on
glycolytic oscillations and equal diffusion coefficients are assumed
for ATP and ADP. We identify the enzyme concentration and the
glycolytic flux as possible targets for the regulation of the
pattern. I finally discuss how the formation of Turing patterns in
this biochemical pathway could be related to organizing centers
in eukaryotic cells, playing a role during cell division.