- Lectures
- Institute of Biomedical Sciences
- Location
B1B Lecture Room, IBMS
- Speaker Name
Dr. Hans I-Chen Harn (USC)
- State
Definitive
- Url
https://www.ibms.sinica.edu.tw/ch/seminars/seminars-detail-2025-8-1216.html
The transformation of flat integument into complex organ architectures remains a central question in regenerative and developmental biology. Both processes involve multitude events of collective cellular behaviors on multiscale control: cellular reprogramming, migration, mechanotransduction circuitry, and tissue remodeling. While dermal fibroblasts exhibit multipotency in vitro, their plasticity during in vivo regeneration remains elusive. Using comparative models of adult regenerative wound healing in Mus musculus and Acomys cahirinus, alongside avian feather and scale development, we explore how cells integrate mechanical and molecular cues to coordinate fate decisions and tissue patterning. We show that mechanical tuning via wound bed stiffness or dermal cell adhesion modulation are essential for morphogenetic field formation, influencing dermal cell fate differentiation and regenerative outcomes (e.g. hair follicle, vasculature formation etc.). In developing avian skin, regional tissue mechanics and dermal cell activity initiate localised chemo-mechanical circuits driving multiple series of tissue folding, leading to feather follicle or alternatively, scale formation. These cross-species studies reveal conserved principles of mechano-chemical coupling, offering new insights into cellular reprogramming events in tissue regeneration and skin appendage evolution.