MeSoForTiss

The morphogenesis of developing embryos and organs relies on cells‚ abilities to change shape and to remodel their contacts with other cells. These behaviors stem at the celular level from interplay between the cortical tension and adhesion. In this context, we aim at elucidating how cortical actin network and adhesion molecules (E-cadherin) are spatially organized at cell boundaries in a tissue, how their spatial order changes during contact remodelling, and probe some of their mechanical properties. To do so we will develop a microscope with a resolution of a few tens of nm (~50 nm in the three dimensions) and use a set of experimental tools which are able to probe dynamic changes of molecular order and force distribution. To tackle these questions, we will study the early epithelium of Drosophila embryos, which is amenable to powerful optical methods for imaging and mechanical perturbation, as well as to biochemical perturbations and genetic functional tests.