{"id":239464,"date":"2026-06-23T02:17:29","date_gmt":"2026-06-23T07:17:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/06\/a-minimal-model-for-how-a-cell-takes-shape-from-the-inside"},"modified":"2026-06-23T02:17:29","modified_gmt":"2026-06-23T07:17:29","slug":"a-minimal-model-for-how-a-cell-takes-shape-from-the-inside","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/06\/a-minimal-model-for-how-a-cell-takes-shape-from-the-inside","title":{"rendered":"A minimal model for how a cell takes shape from the inside"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/a-minimal-model-for-how-a-cell-takes-shape-from-the-inside2.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Researchers at the University of Twente and Utrecht University have packed rigid, rod-shaped particles into soft lipid containers the size of a living cell and watched the container and its contents reshape each other. The vesicle\u2019s form determines how the rods line up; the tightly packed rods, in turn, bend the container into new shapes. This provides a minimal model for how physical coupling between a soft boundary and internal filaments can help cellular structures organize from within. The paper is <a href=\"https:\/\/pnas.org\/doi\/10.1073\/pnas.2604848123\" target=\"_blank\">published<\/a> in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.<\/p>\n<p>Living cells are crowded with filaments. These threadlike scaffolds hold a cell in shape, push it forward when it moves and pull it apart when it divides, all inside a soft membrane that bends and flows around them. The filaments shape the membrane, and the membrane in turn constrains the filaments.<\/p>\n<p>Physicists understand one half of that exchange, but mostly for rigid containers. Pack enough rod-shaped particles into a fixed box and they switch from a disordered jumble to neat alignment, much like matches settling when you shake the box. What happens when the container can give way had barely been tested. A flexible wall can deform to make room for its contents, so the familiar rules no longer hold.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Researchers at the University of Twente and Utrecht University have packed rigid, rod-shaped particles into soft lipid containers the size of a living cell and watched the container and its contents reshape each other. The vesicle\u2019s form determines how the rods line up; the tightly packed rods, in turn, bend the container into new shapes. [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":427,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-239464","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-particle-physics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/239464","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/427"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=239464"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/239464\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=239464"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=239464"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=239464"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}