Morphogenesis Credit:
University of Cambridge
(December 10, 2015) Researchers
have identified a new mechanism that drives the development of form and
structure, through the observation of artificial materials that shape-shift
through a wide variety of forms which are as complex as those seen in nature.
Researchers have developed a new method for generating
complex shapes, and have found that the development of form in nature can be
driven by the physical properties of materials themselves, in contrast with
earlier findings. The results, reported in the journal Nature, could enable the
construction of complex structures from simple components, with potential
applications in pharmaceuticals, paints, cosmetics and household products such
as shampoo.
Using a simple set-up – essentially droplets of oil in a
soapy water solution which were slowly frozen – the researchers found that
recently-discovered ‘plastic crystal’ phases formed on the inside surfaces of
the droplets causes them to shape-shift into a wide variety of forms, from
octahedrons and hexagons to triangles and fibres.
Previous efforts to create such complex shapes and
structures have used top-down processing methods, which allow a high degree of
control, but are not efficient in terms of the amount of material used or the
expensive equipment necessary to make the shapes. The new method, developed by
researchers from the University of Cambridge and Sofia University in Bulgaria,
uses a highly efficient, extremely simple bottom-up approach to create complex
shapes.
“There are many ways that non-biological things take shape,”
said Dr Stoyan Smoukov from Cambridge’s Department of Materials Science &
Metallurgy, who led the research. “But the question is what drives the process
and how to control it – and what are the links between the process in the
biological and the non-biological world?”
Smoukov’s research proposes a possible answer to the
question of what drives this process, called morphogenesis. In animals,
morphogenesis controls the distribution of cells during embryonic development,
and can also be seen in mature animals, such as in a growing tumour.
In the 1950s, the codebreaker and mathematician Alan Turing
proposed that morphogenesis is driven by reaction-diffusion, in which local
chemical reactions cause a substance to spread through a space. More recent
research, from Smoukov’s group and others, has proposed that it is physical
properties of materials that control the process. This possibility had been
anticipated by Turing, but it was impossible to determine using the computers
of the time.