Modeling cell decisions in bone formation

RODRIGO ASSAR; ALEJANDRO MAAS; JOAQUÍN FERNÁNDEZ; ERNESTO KOFMAN; MARTÍN MONTECINO

Isla de San Andrés

Conferencia; International Conference on Applied Mathematics and Informatics; 2013

Universidad del Valle

Abstract The process of bone formation involves several mechanisms, which can manifest dysfunctions such as osteoporosis in case of imbalances between them. In basic terms, osteo-adipo progenitors derive from the bone marrow, and depending on multiple stimulus signals, can stay in their progenitor state (preosteoblast) or can differentiate to form bone and fat tissue ([2]). We point to model the dynamics of thecell decisions to differentiate from preosteoblasts to osteoblasts, considering stimulatory signals, and the important role of epigenetics. Given a cell, the presence of specific epigenetic marks, favors the expression of biomarker genes and the posterior differentiation into osteoblasts. Starting with a group of marked cells, we model in silico the proliferation of such cells and the epigenetic inheritance. We consider ahybrid system ([7, 3]), in which each cell grows continuously over time, according to a well-known model (complex models in case of mammals), until being ready to divide, and the success in division and epigenetic inheritance are randomly modeled. Stimulating the proliferation of marked cells, the model predicts increases in the final number of osteoblasts helping in testing medical treatments and productionin-vitro of cell cultures.