Mechanics of tissue competition: Interfaces stabilize coexistence

Abstract

Mechanical forces influence the dynamics of growing tissues. Computer simulations are employed to study the importance of interfacial effects in tissue competition. It was speculated that mechanical pressure determines the competition, where the determining quantity is the homeostatic pressure - the pressure where division and apoptosis balance; the tissue with the higher homeostatic pressure overwhelms the other. Surprisingly, a weaker tissue can persist in stable coexistence with a stronger tissue, if adhesion between them is small enough. An analytic continuum description can quantitatively describe the underlying mechanism and reproduce the resulting pressures and cell-number fractions. Computer simulations furthermore display a variety of coexisting structures, ranging from spherical inclusions to a bicontinuous state.