Actin flows in cell migration: from locomotion and polarity to trajectories

Abstract

Eukaryotic cell movement is characterized by very diverse migration modes. Recent studies show that cells can adapt to environmental cues, such as adhesion and geometric confinement, thereby readily switching their mode of migration. Among this diversity of motile behavior, actin flows have emerged as a highly conserved feature of both mesenchymal and amoeboid migration, and have also been identified as key regulators of cell polarity. This suggests that the various observed migration modes are continuous variations of elementary locomotion mechanisms, based on a very robust physical property of the actin/myosin system - its ability to sustain flows at the cell scale. This central role of actin/myosin flows is shown to affect the large scale properties of cell trajectories.