Accurate Modelling of the Dynamics of Human Eukaryotic Cells in Flows

The motion of eukaryotic cells in a fluid medium, such as blood, lies at the heart of fundamental biological processes and underlies various pathologies, from infections to cancer metastasis. In the flow, cells experience stresses and deformations that heavily influence their behaviour and function.

However, accurate mechanical modelling of the motion, deformation and stresses of suspended eukaryotic cells has been a classical challenge, due to the complex viscoelastic structure of the cells, and the nonlinear interactions between the cells and suspension fluid.

The fellowship will tackle this challenge and it will develop a general mechanical modelling framework to enable high-fidelity computational predictions of the motion, deformation and stresses of human eukaryotic cells suspended in a flowing fluid medium.

The fundamental development will make possible a wealth of new exciting research, ranging from understanding the flow and stresses of circulating tumour cells in the cardiovascular system during cancer metastasis, to designing next-generation microfluidic technologies that can isolate targeted cells from blood with high purity without using fluorescent or magnetic tags.

The fellowship will provide a unique opportunity for a talented young researcher to acquire essential new skills and to develop collaborations with EU research leaders.