Research article
Growth Cone Pathfinding: a competition between deterministic and stochastic events
1 Department of Chemical and Biochemical Engineering, Rutgers University, 98 Brett Road, Piscataway, NJ, 08854, USA
2 Department of Biomedical Engineering, Rutgers University, 617 Bowser Road, Piscataway, NJ, 08854, USA
BMC Neuroscience 2004, 5:22 doi:10.1186/1471-2202-5-22
Published: 8 July 2004Abstract
Background
Growth cone migratory patterns show evidence of both deterministic and stochastic search modes.
Results
We quantitatively examine how these two different migration modes affect the growth cone's pathfinding response, by simulating growth cone contact with a repulsive cue and measuring the resultant turn angle. We develop a dimensionless number, we call the determinism ratio Ψ, to define the ratio of deterministic to stochastic influences driving the growth cone's migration in response to an external guidance cue. We find that the growth cone can exhibit three distinct types of turning behaviors depending on the magnitude of Ψ.
Conclusions
We conclude, within the context of these in silico studies, that only when deterministic and stochastic migration factors are in balance (i.e. Ψ ~ 1) can the growth cone respond constructively to guidance cues.
