SFB 1054 Seminar - Jörg Renkawitz
Walter Brendel Zentrum München, BioMedical Center, LMU
24.10.2019 at 12:15
Title: Leukocyte Navigation Strategies: from Pore Choices to Microenvironmental Adaption
During metazoan development, immune surveillance and cancer dissemination, cells migrate in complex three-dimensional (3D) microenvironments. These are crowded by cells and extracellular matrix, generating mazes of differently sized spaces typically smaller than the diameter of the migrating cell. Most mesenchymal and epithelial cells and some but not all cancer cells actively generate their migratory path using pericellular tissue proteolysis. On the contrary, amoeboid cells such as leukocytes employ non- destructive strategies of locomotion, raising the question how these extremely fast cells navigate through dense tissues.
Here, I will first show our recent discovery that leukocytes sample their immediate vicinity for large pore sizes and are thereby able to choose the path of least resistance. This allows them to circumnavigate local obstacles while effectively following global directional cues such as chemotactic gradients. Pore size discrimination is facilitated by frontward positioning of the nucleus, thus enabling the cells to use their bulkiest compartment as a mechanical gauge. As nuclear positioning in front of the microtubule organizing center is a typical feature of amoeboid migration, these findings link the fundamental organization of cellular polarity to the strategy of locomotion. Moreover, I will show our recent data on the plasticity of these leukocyte navigation strategies during migration in 3D microenvironments.
Venue:
BioMedical Center (BMC), Room N 01.017,
Großhaderner Str. 9, Planegg-Martinsried
Host: Anne Krug (A06)
If you wish to talk to the speaker, please contact Katharina.Frank@med.uni-muenchen.de
