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Cell biology

How cilia beat

Physics provides new approaches to difficult biological problems: a plausible mathematical model of how cilia and flagella beat has been formulated, but it needs to be subjected to rigorous experimental tests.

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Figure 1: Axoneme structure and dynein regulation.
Figure 2: Self-organized oscillations in a system of opposed motors and springs.

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Mitchison, T., Mitchison, H. How cilia beat. Nature 463, 308–309 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1038/463308a

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