Mammalian cell colony growth

A mammalian cell colony is modeled as a set of contacting deformable particles. A particle can be substituted by a pair of new particles that models the process of cell division. Specific features of this simulation are:

• Particles have arbitrary shapes defined by real functions;
• Particles follow particular rules of behaviour;
• Communication between particles is defined by a collision (interpenetration) detection algorithm;
• For simulation of a deformable particle, we dynamically change its shape, size and orientation;
• A genetic algorithm is used to solve the packing problem.

Figures a-d below show a simulated process of colony growth:

a b
c d

Zoom view of the colony shows irregular shapes of the particles.

Figures e-g below show immortalized human lymphocytes AHH-1 photographed by Polaroid MicroCam camera (x200 magnification) installed on an Olympus CK2 microscope:

e f g

The algorithms used in our simulation are discussed in the paper:

Savchenko V.V., A.G.Basnakian , Pasko A.A., S.V.Ten , R.Huang
"Simulation of a growing mammalian cell colony: collision-based packing algorithm for deformable particles", Computer Graphics: Developments in Virtual Environments, R.Earnshaw and J.Vince (Eds.), (CG International'95 Conference, Leeds, UK, June 26-30), 1995, Academic Press, pp.437-447.

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