title: Theoretical Prediction of Disrupted Min Oscillation in Flattened Escherichia coli.
abstract: The dynamics of the Min-protein system help Escherichia coli regulate the process of cell division by identifying the center of the cell. While this system exhibits robust bipolar oscillations in wild-type cell shapes, recent experiments have shown that when the cells are mechanically deformed into wide, flattened out, irregular shapes, the spatial regularity of these oscillations breaks down. We employ widely used stochastic and deterministic models of the Min system to simulate cells with flattened shapes. The deterministic model predicts strong bipolar oscillations, in contradiction with the experimentally observed behavior, while the stochastic model, which is based on the same reaction-diffusion equations, predicts more spatially irregular oscillations. We further report simulations of flattened but more symmetric shapes, which suggest that the flattening and lateral expansion may contribute as much to the irregular oscillation behavior as the asymmetry of the cell shapes.
authors.affiliation: Dept. of Physics, Oregon State University, Corvallis, Oregon, United States of America.
authors.forename: Jeff B
authors.initials: JB
authors.lastname: Schulte
authors.affiliation: Dept. of Physics, Oregon State University, Corvallis, Oregon, United States of America.
authors.forename: Rene W
authors.initials: RW
authors.lastname: Zeto
authors.affiliation: Dept. of Physics, Oregon State University, Corvallis, Oregon, United States of America.
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Roundy
mesh_terms: D001683:Biological Clocks; D004254:DNA Nucleotidyltransferases / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism*; D004926:Escherichia coli / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism*; D029968:Escherichia coli Proteins / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism*; D008954:Models, Biological
chemical_list: D029968:Escherichia coli Proteins; D004254:DNA Nucleotidyltransferases; C062905:min recombinase