Ciliary chemosensitivity is enhanced by cilium geometry and motility.
Elife
; 102021 08 04.
Article
in English
| MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-1513060
ABSTRACT
Cilia are hairlike organelles involved in both sensory functions and motility. We discuss the question of whether the location of chemical receptors on cilia provides an advantage in terms of sensitivity and whether motile sensory cilia have a further advantage. Using a simple advection-diffusion model, we compute the capture rates of diffusive molecules on a cilium. Because of its geometry, a non-motile cilium in a quiescent fluid has a capture rate equivalent to a circular absorbing region with â¼4× its surface area. When the cilium is exposed to an external shear flow, the equivalent surface area increases to â¼6×. Alternatively, if the cilium beats in a non-reciprocal way in an otherwise quiescent fluid, its capture rate increases with the beating frequency to the power of 1/3. Altogether, our results show that the protruding geometry of a cilium could be one of the reasons why so many receptors are located on cilia. They also point to the advantage of combining motility with chemical reception.
Keywords
Full text:
Available
Collection:
International databases
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
Organic Chemicals
/
Cilia
/
Inorganic Chemicals
Language:
English
Year:
2021
Document Type:
Article
Affiliation country:
ELife.66322
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