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Topological defects in biological matter

Topological defects play an important role in biology, as shown by a growing body of evidence. Aleksandra Ardaševa and Amin Doostmohammadi survey the new research directions that are opening.

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Fig. 1: Moving bacteria can be trapped by topological defects of their own making.

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Acknowledgements

A.D. acknowledges funding from the Novo Nordisk Foundation (grant no. NNF18SA0035142), Villum Fonden (grant no. 29476). A.A. and A.D. acknowledge support from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant agreement no. 847523 (INTERACTIONS).

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Correspondence to Amin Doostmohammadi.

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Ardaševa, A., Doostmohammadi, A. Topological defects in biological matter. Nat Rev Phys 4, 354–356 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s42254-022-00469-9

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