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Updated: May 23, 2026

AMEBaS: Automatic Midline Extraction and Background Subtraction of Ratiometric Fluorescence Time-Lapses of Polarized Single Cells
Published on: June 23, 2023
Cell polarity: quantitative modeling as a tool in cell biology
Alex Mogilner1, Jun Allard, Roy Wollman
1Department of Neurobiology, Physiology, and Behavior, University of California, Davis, CA 95616, USA. mogilner@math.ucdavis.edu
Abstract:
Among a number of innovative approaches that have modernized cell biology, modeling has a prominent yet unusual place. One popular view is that we progress linearly, from conceptual to ever more detailed models. We review recent discoveries of cell polarity mechanisms, in which modeling played an important role, to demonstrate that the experiment-theory feedback loop requires diverse models characterized by varying levels of biological detail and mathematical complexity. We argue that a quantitative model is a tool that has to fit an experimental study, and the model's value should be judged not by how complex and detailed it is, but by what could be learned from it.
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