title: Scaling and regeneration of self-organized patterns.
abstract: Biological patterns generated during development and regeneration often scale with organism size. Some organisms, e.g., flatworms, can regenerate a rescaled body plan from tissue fragments of varying sizes. Inspired by these examples, we introduce a generalization of Turing patterns that is self-organized and self-scaling. A feedback loop involving diffusing expander molecules regulates the reaction rates of a Turing system, thereby adjusting pattern length scales proportional to system size. Our model captures essential features of body plan regeneration in flatworms as observed in experiments.
authors.affiliation: Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems, Nöthnitzer Straße 38, 01187 Dresden, Germany.
authors.forename: Steffen
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Werner
authors.affiliation: Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics, Pfotenhauerstr. 108, 01307 Dresden, Germany.
authors.forename: Tom
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Stückemann
authors.affiliation: Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems, Nöthnitzer Straße 38, 01187 Dresden, Germany.|Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Ciudad Universitaria de Cantoblanco, 28049 Madrid, Spain.
authors.forename: Manuel
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Beirán Amigo
authors.affiliation: Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics, Pfotenhauerstr. 108, 01307 Dresden, Germany.
authors.forename: Jochen C
authors.initials: JC
authors.lastname: Rink
authors.affiliation: Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems, Nöthnitzer Straße 38, 01187 Dresden, Germany.
authors.forename: Frank
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Jülicher
authors.affiliation: Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems, Nöthnitzer Straße 38, 01187 Dresden, Germany.
authors.forename: Benjamin M
authors.initials: BM
authors.lastname: Friedrich
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D019521:Body Patterning / Q000502:physiology*; D008954:Models, Biological; D010932:Planarians; D012038:Regeneration / Q000502:physiology*