Fundamental limits to collective concentration sensing in cell populations

Abstract

The precision of concentration sensing is improved when cells communicate. Here we derive the physical limits to concentration sensing for cells that communicate over short distances by directly exchanging small molecules (juxtacrine signaling), or over longer distances by secreting and sensing a diffusive messenger molecule (autocrine signaling). In the latter case, we find that the optimal cell spacing can be large, due to a tradeoff between maintaining communication strength and reducing signal cross-correlations. This leads to the surprising result that autocrine signaling allows more precise sensing than juxtacrine signaling for sufficiently large populations. We compare our results to data from a wide variety of communicating cell types.