Sculpting With Stiffness: Rigidity as a Regulator of Morphogenesis

The mini-review explores the critical role of tissue stiffness in morphogenesis, emphasizing how mechanical properties like stiffness guide biological development. It discusses how varying tissue stiffness can lead to different morphological outcomes, such as elongation or buckling, and highlights examples like the Drosophila egg chamber and intestinal villi. The review underscores the interplay between genetic and mechanical signals in shaping tissues, suggesting that mechanical heterogeneity is key to organ morphogenesis. It also examines how substrate rigidity influences cell behavior, migration, and tumorigenesis, with cells migrating toward stiffer areas, impacting processes like neural crest cell migration and cancer invasion. The document concludes by emphasizing the importance of understanding material properties, such as viscosity and stress-relaxation, in morphogenesis, with new technologies like Brillouin microscopy offering insights into tissue development.