Speaker
Description
The coexistence of diverse phenotypic traits within a population - such as variations in cell movement, growth, or signalling - can profoundly shape collective dynamics of cell populations. To capture these complexities, classical PDE models for cell migration can be extended to include phenotypic structuring, giving rise to a powerful class of non-local models: phenotype-structured partial integro-differential equations (PS-PIDEs). In this talk, I will present a tutorial-style review paper dedicated to this growing field \cite{lorenzi2025phenotype}, offering both a pedagogical foundation for teaching and a roadmap for advancing research. We will first explore the current state of the art of how PS-PIDEs can be formally derived from agent-based models, analysed with semi-classical asymptotic methods, and solved numerically, in order to investigate the emergence of spatial sorting of the population at the tissue-scale due to the interplay between cell adaptive dynamics and environmental feedback. Finally, we will discuss open mathematical and interdisciplinary challenges expected to shape the future of this field.
Bibliography
@article{lorenzi2025phenotype,
title={Phenotype structuring in collective cell migration: a tutorial of mathematical models and methods},
author={Lorenzi, Tommaso and Painter, Kevin J and Villa, Chiara},
journal={Journal of Mathematical Biology},
volume={90},
number={6},
pages={61},
year={2025},
publisher={Springer}
}
