Active chemo-mechanical solitons

Lev Truskinovsky; Giuseppe Zurlo

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arXiv · 2501.11368

Active chemo-mechanical solitons

Lev Truskinovsky·Giuseppe Zurlo

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Abstract

In many biological systems localized mechanical information is transmitted by mechanically neutral chemical signals. Typical examples include contraction waves in acto-myosin cortex at cellular scale and peristaltic waves at tissue level. In such systems, chemical activity is transformed into mechanical deformation by distributed motor-type mechanisms represented by continuum degrees of freedom. To elucidate the underlying principles of chemo-mechanical coupling, we here present the simplest example, involving directional motion of a localized solitary wave in a distributed mechanical system, guided by a purely chemical cue. Our main result is that mechanical signals can be driven by chemical activity in a highly efficient manner.

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Lev Truskinovsky, Giuseppe Zurlo. 2025-01-20. Active chemo-mechanical solitons. https://arxiv.org/abs/2501.11368

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