Gentry Series: Public Talk – Björn Sandstede

Björn Sandstede, Brown University
Gentry Public Talk: From zebrafish patterns to math and back
Carswell 111, Annenberg Forum
Reception following the talk in the Magnolia Room, Reynolda Hall.

For the comfort of all, please refrain from wearing scented products.

Spatial patterns are widespread in nature and often form during the early development of organisms due to the self-organization of cells. One example are zebrafish: wild-type zebrafish have regular black and gold stripes, while mutants and other fish species feature spotty and patchy patterns. I will first give an overview of Turing’s ideas about morphogenesis on animal coats. Afterwards I will showcase a much more detailed agent-based model that makes specific predictions for how pigment cells in zebrafish may interact to cause stripe and spot patterns to emerge. In the second part of the talk, I will focus on how we can use topological data analysis to quantify the variability of the emerging patterns on both microscopic and macroscopic scales.