1304.3657 (Timon Idema et al.)

Mechanical signaling via nonlinear wavefront propagation in a
mechanically-excitable medium    [PDF]

Timon Idema, Andrea J. Liu

Models that invoke nonlinear wavefront propagation in a chemically excitable medium are rife in the biological literature. Indeed, the idea that wavefront propagation can serve as a signaling mechanism has often been invoked to explain synchronization of developmental processes. In this paper we suggest a new kind of signaling based not on diffusion of a chemical species but on the propagation of mechanical stress. We construct a theoretical approach to describe mechanical signaling as a nonlinear wavefront propagation problem and study its dependence on key variables such as the effective elasticity and damping of the medium.

View original: http://arxiv.org/abs/1304.3657