“Suzan Mazur: Nigel Goldenfeld in recent years referred to biology as the ‘new condensed matter physics.’
Eugene Koonin: Yes. He wrote a paper with the late Carl Woese where they expressed this, and I agree. Maybe with a caveat. I would rather say biology has to become the new condensed matter physics.”—“Eugene Koonin: ‘The New Evolutionary Biology,'” Huff Post
Not since the biomath genius of D’Arcy Thompson, the Osaka structuralists, and the curve of Manolo Blahnik has the science of shape been so in the spotlight as now. From the Americas to the UK and Europe to Singapore and Down Under Australia, events are in evidence drawing attention to the dynamics of mechanobiology and to the mechanome.
What do I mean by mechanobiology and the mechanome? Wikipedia defines mechanobiology as the “field of science at the interface of biology and engineering that focuses on how physical forces and changes in the mechanical properties of cells and tissues contribute to development, cell differentiation, physiology, and disease.”
And the mechanome? Think systems-level “omics,” regarding the role of force, mechanics, and machinery in biology.
[See also next month’s University of California-Irvine meeting, “The Mechanome in Action,” in the conference list that follows.]
The mechanobiology field actually goes by assorted names, among them: soft matter, the new condensed matter physics, morphomechanics, morphometrics, biomechanics, biophysics, mathematical biology (partial list), and importantly integrates life across the board: animals, plants, fungi, microbes—which has to include viruses. It also encompasses materials science. So you can put active matter under the mechanobiology umbrella (but without Lee Cronin’s “Alien chemist“).
When I say mechanobiology is all the rage, I’m not simply referring to lab research and scientific conferences on the subject, although they are, of course, central. But also to: (1) mechanobiology university courses based on current scientific papers (not textbooks); (2) academic bootcamp to train high school teachers about mechanobiology; (3) university fellowships tied to the mentoring of students K-12 on mechanobiology; (4) various museum installations, including a permanent, full scale exhibit on shape designed to interactively educate kids as young as toddlers—to cite a few examples.
Private foundations such as the Simons Foundation; government organizations—in particular, the National Science Foundation and National Institutes of Health in the US, European Research Council, and Singapore’s National Research Foundation; plus industry are all keen on supporting the science, with industry recognizing extensive possibilities for applications.
For example, the Center for Engineering and MechanoBiology (CEMB) at the University of Pennsylvania has a robust mechanobiology program, describing its mission as follows:
“CEMB, with its focus on the interactions between structure, mechanics, and function in both the plant and animal kingdoms, will have a major impact on the ability to construct engineered tissues and organs, create new scaffolds for tissue repair and regeneration, integrate implants in reconstructive surgery, provide therapy for tissue inflammation and fibrosis, develop designer cellulose fibers, manage crops that are resistant to stresses and require fewer resources, and understand the positive and negative effects of exercise, activity, and trauma.”
And Washington University in St. Louis , a CEMB partner, cites this as its aim in mechanobiology training:
“The overarching goal of the MBnc Training Program is to provide pre-doctoral students at Washington University with the insight and skills needed to elucidate the role of mechanical forces in biological systems across many length scales. . . . We aim to provide pre-doctoral students in basic biological science with enhanced training in mechanics and to train pre-doctoral engineering and physics students to apply advanced mechanics to biological problems. These ambitious paired objectives will enhance interactions among students and provide trainees with skill sets tailored to address questions involving mechanics in biology.”
So, after decades of being derailed by selfish gene dogma, biology appears to be back on course and mechanobiology flourishing.
Following is a country-by-country sampling of recent and future mechanobiology conferences:
Austria:
(1) InCem, “International Symposium Measuring and Modelling Cell Migration,” Vienna, Austria, February 22-25, 2018
(2) ATMCS8 (“Algebraic Topology, Methods, Computation and Science”), Institute of Science and Technology, Klosterneuburg, Austria, June 25-29, 2018
(3) 8th Summer School on Biomechanics, from Tissue to Organ: Modeling and Computation, Graz University of Technology, Graz, Austria, September 3-7, 2018
(4) Joint Meeting of the German and Israeli Societies of Developmental Biology, University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria, February 17-20, 2019
Australia:
1st “Mechanobiology Down Under” meeting, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, May 3-4, 2018
Belgium:
International Solvay Institutes, Workshop on “Mechanics of slender structures in physics, biology and engineering: from failure to functionality,” Universite Libre de Bruxelles, Brussels, Belgium, August 27-29, 2018
Brazil:
“Geometry of Soft Matter,” International Institute of Physics, Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte, Lagoa Nova, Brazil, May 21-25, 2018
Canada:
(1) ICMCM 2018: 20th International Conference on Mathematics and Computational Mechanobiology, Montreal, Canada, May 24-25, 2018
(2) Japan-Toronto Morphogenesis Symposium, University of Toronto, Canada, July 16-17, 2018
(3) 9th International Plant Biomechanics Conference, Montreal, Canada, August 9-14, 2018
(4) MechanoChemBio2019: Multiscale Mechanochemistry & Mechanobiology from molecular mechanisms to smart materials, McGill University, Montreal Canada, July 29-31, 2019
Chile:
EMBO Workshop: Bridging cell and tissue mechanics to fate specification in development, Santiago, Chile, April 2-5, 2019
Cuba:
Statistical Physics Approaches to Systems Biology, University of Havana, Havana, Cuba, February 4-15, 2019
Czech Republic:
International Conference of Vertebrate Morphology, Grandior Hotel, Prague, Czech Republic, July 21-25, 2019
Finland:
“Tiny Lipids With Grand Functions,” International Workshop on Biological Membranes, University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland, August 19-22, 2018
France:
(1) BIOPOL Summer School on Mechanobiology of Polarized Cells, Les Houches, France, April 8-13, 2018
(2) First International School on Hemophysics, Monpellier, France, May 15-18, 2018
(3) “Physical Approaches to Understanding Microbial Life,” Summer School PALM (Laboratoire d’Excellence Physique: Atomes Lumiere Matiere), Paris, France, August 28-September 6, 2018
(4) Physics of Living Matter, Marseille, France, September 11-12, 2018
(5) Summer Course on Physical Biology of Morphogenesis, EMBO workshop, Cargese, Corsica, France, September 11-21, 2018
(6) 3rd International Meeting on Building the Cell, Institut Pasteur, Paris, France, September 26-28, 2018
(7) “Modeling Cell Fate,” Conferences Jacques Monod/CNRS, Roscoff (Brittany), France, November 19-23, 2018
(8) Fifth International Oocyte Meeting, Institut de la Mer de Villefranche (IMEV), CNRS – Sorbonne University, Villefranche-sur-mer, France, January 16-19, 2019
(9) 4th Workshop in Mechanobiology and Physics of Life in Lyon, Amphi Merieux, Lyon, France, January 28, 2019
(10) Developmental and Cell Biology of the Future, Biopark Auditorium, Paris, France, March 27-28, 2019
(11) Biology and Physics Confront Cell-Cell Adhesion, Biophysics Society, Aussois, France, October 14-17, 2019
Germany:
(1) SoftComp Topical Workshop on Filaments, Membranes, Cells and their Interactions, Research Center, Juelich, Germany, January 28-31, 2018
(2) “Tissue Self-Organisation: Challenging the Systems,” EMBO/EMBL symposia, EMBL, Heidelberg, Germany, March 11-14, 2018
(3) International Titisee Conference: “117th From Oocyte to Embryo—Illuminating the Origins of Life,” Black Forest, Germany, April 11-15, 2018
(4) “Key Challenges in Biophysics,” Munich, Germany, July 31 – August 2, 2018
(5) Biennial Meeting of the German Biophysical Society, Duesseldorf, Germany, September 16-19, 2018
(6) International Symposium on Mechanobiology: Measuring and Modeling Cell Migration, Aachen, Germany, September 27-28, 2018
(7) BIOMS Symposium 2018, University of Heidelberg, Germany, October 1-2, 2018
(8) Juelich Soft Matter Days 2018, Institute for Complex Systems, Juelich, Germany, November 20-23, 2018
(9) Synthetic Morphogenesis, EMBO/EMBL Symposia, Heidelberg, Germany, March 17-20, 2019
(10) Mechanical Forces in Development, EMBO/EMBL Symposia, Heidelberg, Germany, July 3-6, 2019
India:
(1) EMBO Lecture Course: Experimental and Theoretical Approaches to Cell Mechanics, Bangalore, India, April 23 – May 6, 2017
(2) Q-Mat, a cross section of new condensed matter physics research, Mohali, India, July 25-27, 2018
(3) Indo-French Research Workshop on Theory and Simulation of Hyperbolic PDEs arising in Mathematical Biology and Fluid Flow, BITS-Pilani University, Pilani, India, January 5-11, 2019
Ireland:
8th World Congress of Biomechanics, Dublin, Ireland, July 8-12, 2018
Italy:
(1) “Nanoengineering for Mechanobiology,” Camogli, Genova, Italy, March 25-28, 2018
(2) Wivace Conference highlighting the “quantum nature of biology and life,” etc., Parma, Italy, September 10-12, 2018
(3) CISM-AIMETA Advanced School on Cell Mechanobiology: Theory and Experiments on the Mechanics of Life, Udine, Italy, September 24-28, 2018
(4) CELLMECH 2019, 8th Biennal European Cell Mechanics Meeting, Milan, Italy, June 3-6, 2019
Japan:
(1) 20th International Conference on Mechanobiology and Biomechanics, September 13-14, 2018, Osaka, Japan
(2) 3rd International Symposium on Nanoarchitectonics for Mechanobiology, National Institute for Materials Science, Tsukuba, Japan, March 7-8, 2019
(3) BDR Symposium 2019: Control and Design of Biosystems, RIKEN Center for Biosystems Dynamic Research (BDR), Kobe, Japan, March 25-27, 2019
Montenegro:
Regional Biophysics School on Mechanobiology (“From Ion Channels to Biomaterials, Animal and Plant Systems, Biophysical Techniques of Analysis”), Kotor, Montenegro, October 6-8, 2018
New Zealand:
11th Australasian Biomechanics Conference in tandem with the 10th Annual Mechanobiology Symposium and the Matrix Biology Society Australia New Zealand Annual Meeting, Auckland, New Zealand, December 3-5, 2018
Portugal:
CMBBE 2018: 15th International Symposium Computer Methods in Biomechanics and Biomedical Engineering and 3rd Conference on Imaging and Visualization, Instituto Superior Technico, Lisbon, Portugal, March 26-29, 2018
Russia:
(1) “Physics of Cancer,” Institute of Strength Physics and Materials Science, Siberian Branch of Russian Academy of Sciences, Tomsk, Russia, May 23-26, 2017
(2) 13th Russian-German Conference on Biomedical Engineering, Aachen, Germany, May 23-25, 2018
Singapore:
(1) “Mechanobiology in Health and Disease,” Mechanobiology Institute (MBI), National University of Singapore (NUS) and Institute of Medical Biology, Singapore, May 31, 2018
(2) 2018 Bootcamp on Mechanobiology: “An Integrative Approach to Understand Cell Function,” MBI, NUS, Singapore, August 2-11, 2018
Slovenia:
“Mechanobiology of Cells and Tissues in Health and Disease,” Slovenia, June 13-15, 2018
Spain:
“Mechanobiology Across Networks,” Spanish Network of Excellence in Mechanobiology and the European Innovative Training Network BIOPOL, Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia, October 6-7, 2016
Switzerland:
EMBO Workshop on Cell and Developmental Systems, Arolla, Switzerland, August 20-24, 2018
The Netherlands:
(1) “On Growth and Form 2017” Workshop, Lorentz Center (Leiden) and Institute for Advanced Studies, University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands, October 23-27, 2017
(2) 1st International Symposium on Building a Synthetic Cell (BaSyC), Delft, The Netherlands, August 28-29, 2018
United Kingdom:
(1) “On Growth and Form 100,” University of Dundee and University of St Andrews, Scotland, October 13-15, 2017
(2) “Mechanics of Development,” Royal Society, Buckinghamshire, UK, February 5-7, 2018
(3) British Biophysical Society (BBS) Biennial Meeting, University of Southampton, UK, July 11-13, 2018
(4) Physics of Life Summer School, Grey College, Durham University, UK, July 16-20, 2018
(5) EMBO Conference—Physics of Cells: From Biochemical to Mechanical, The Majestic Hotel, Harrogate, UK, September 3-7, 2018
(6) The Physics of Microorganisms II, Institute of Physics, London, UK, April 8, 2019
(7) Contemporary Morphogenesis, The Royal Society, London, UK, October 7-8, 2019
United States:
(1) “Mechanics in Morphogenesis,” Princeton Center for Theoretical Science, Princeton University, Princeton, February 21-23, 2018
(2) Synthetic and Artificial Cells Workshop/Physics of Living Systems (Talk Videos), The Westin Alexandria, Alexandria, Virginia, May 13-15, 2018 (event sponsored by National Science Foundation)
(3) 20th International Conference on Computation and Mathematical Mechanobiology, World Academy of Engineering, New York, June 3-4, 2018
(4) The Physics of Life Summer School, Princeton University, Princeton, June 11-22, 2018
(5) International Physics of Living Systems (iPoLS) Annual Meeting, Rice University, Houston, Texas, June 22-26, 2018
(6) “Mechbio Conference 2018: The Mechanome in Action,” University of California, Irvine, July 26-27, 2018. “The Mechanome in Action” conference is the second in a series of meetings on the subject. The first meeting, “Mechbio Symposium: Putting Together the Cell Mechanome—Finding the pieces, building the puzzle” was hosted by the University of California, San Diego, August 4 and 5, 2016.
(7) “Mechanobiology Symposium,” CEMB (Center for Engineering MechanoBiology with support from NSF), University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, September 13-14, 2018 “will cover emerging issues in forces that control living systems in both plant and animal cells.”
(8) “Morphometrics, Morphogenesis and Mathematics” workshop, Center of Mathematical Sciences and Applications (CMSA), Harvard University, October 22-26, 2018
(9) “Morphogenesis: Geometry and Physics” workshop, CMSA, Harvard University, December 3-6, 2018
(10) American Society for Cell Biology/European Molecular Biology Organization meeting, San Diego, California, December 8-12, 2018
(11) Keystone Symposia: Single Cell Biology, Beaver Run Resort, Breckenridge, Colorado, January 13-17, 2019
(12) Gordon Research Seminar: Directed Cell Migration, Galveston, Texas, January 19-20, 2019; Gordon Research Conference: Directed Cell Migration, Galveston, Texas, January 20-25, 2019
(13) Gordon Research Conference on Physical Virology, Ventura, California, January 20-25, 2019
(14) Gordon Research Seminar—Plant Lipids: Structure, Metabolism and Function, Galveston, Texas, January 26-27, 2019; Gordon Research Conference—Plant Lipids: Structure, Metabolism and Function, Galveston, Texas, January 27-February 1, 2019
(15) “Winter Q-Bio,” Quantitative Biology on the Hawaiian Islands, February 2019
(16) Janelia Conferences: Frontiers in Imaging Science II, Janelia Research Campus, Ashburn, Virginia, May 5-8, 2019
(17) Gordon Research Seminar, Emergence of Complex Tissues from Single Cell Behavior and Cooperation, Mount Holyoke College, South Hadley, Massachusetts, June 15-16, 2019
(18) Gordon Research Conference—Identity and Diversity: Developmental Biology from Molecules to Cells to Organisms, Mount Holyoke College, South Hadley, Massachusetts, June 16-21, 2019
(19) Morphogenesis in Animals and Plants: Search for Principles, Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics, University of California-Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, California, July 22-August 23, 2019
(20) 2nd National Mechanobiology Annual Symposium, Washington University, St. Louis, Missouri, October 13-15, 2019
Vietnam:
(1) “Mechanobiology from Molecules to Tissue,” Recontres du Vietnam, Quy Nhon, Vietnam, June 26-July 2, 2016
(2) 2nd Mechanobiology Meeting in Vietnam: When Physics meets Biology, International Center for Interdisciplinary Science and Education in Vietnam, Quy Nhon, Vietnam, July 7-13, 2019
Labs of Special Note (in no particular order):
CytoMorpho Lab (Laurent Blanchoin, Manuel Théry)
Wolfram Research (Stephen Wolfram)
Hernandez Research Group (Christopher Hernandez)
Nelson Group (Celeste Nelson)
MechMorpho Lab (Lance Davidson)
Manning Group (M. Lisa Manning)
Hiiragi Group (Takashi Hiiragi)
Leptin Group (Maria Leptin)
Mechanics of Mammalian Development (Jean-Léon Maître)
Braun Lab (Dieter Braun)
Liu Lab (Allen Liu)
Pathak Lab (Medha Pathak)
The He Lab (Bing He)
Institute of Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences
Center for the Physics of Living Cells, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Center for Biological Physics, Arizona State University
Center for Biological Physics, University of California-Los Angeles
Center for Biological Physics, University of Massachusetts-Amherst
Center for Soft Matter and Biological Physics, Virginia Tech
University of Washington: Biological Physics, Structure & Design
University of California-San Diego: The Biological Physics Group
Center for Quantitative Biology, University of Peking
Institute of Cell Biophysics—Russia
University Courses:
Caltech: “We will use current literature to explore concepts in signal transduction and mechanics in the context of morphogenesis. This is an area of active research, so it can be argued that the best way to learn about it is to dive into the literature. . . . The course consists almost entirely of reading current literature.”
Washington University in St. Louis: Among the requirements for $24,324 fellowships for graduate students in mechanobiology at Washington University, St Louis is assurance that the grad student will participate in “outreach to K-12 students or community.” The WUSTL program looks across animal, plant and fungi kingdoms.
University of Pennsylvania: Fall 2018, “Integrative Plant and Animal Mechanobiology,” as CEMB describes it:
“This novel course aims to provide students with an understanding of biomechanics that spans the plant and animal kingdoms, with the goal of emphasizing principles common to both. . . . Modules include (1) Plant and Animal Cell Biology; (2) Solid, Fluid, and Transport Mechanics; and (3) Integrating Biology and Mechanics.”
CEMB also supports “a summer professional development initiative for high school science teachers around the interdisciplinary research across the broad themes of mechanobiology. The goal is for teachers to (1) participate in a CEMB research project during the summer, (2) develop a personal curriculum plan with specific lessons and activities to use in their teaching practice the following academic year, and (3) participate in academic year workshops with the project team and other teachers.”
Books and Journals:
Emerging Topics in Physical Virology (eds. Peter G. Stockley, Reidun Twarock)
Mechanobiology Handbook (Jiro Nagatomi)
Mechanobiology in Health and Disease (ed. Stefaan Verbruggen)
Morphomechanics of Development (Lev Beloussov)
Periodic Tables Unifying Living Organisms at the Molecular Level: The Predictive Power of the Law of Periodicity (Antonio Lima-de-Faria)
Plant Biomechanics: From Structure to Function at Multiple Scales (eds. Anja Geitmann, Joseph Gril)
Scale: The Universal Laws of Growth, Innovation, Sustainability, and the Pace of Life in Organisms, Cities, Economies, and Companies (Geoffrey West)
The Physics of Life: The Evolution of Everything (Adrian Bejan)
ACS Biomaterials Science & Engineering
Biomechanics and Modeling in Mechanobiology
Journal of the Mechanical Behavior of Biomedical Materials
Nature (Mechanobiology Focus, December 2017)
For more—see new book—Darwin Overthrown: Hello Mechanobiology.
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