Wheeler Jeanette D, Chan Kit Yu Karen
Department of Biology, Memorial University of Newfoundland and Labrador, St. John's, NL, Canada.
Biology Department, Swarthmore College, Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, USA.
Integr Comp Biol. 2023 Aug 16. doi: 10.1093/icb/icad115.
The symposium "Large-scale biological phenomena arising from small-scale biophysical processes" at the SICB 2023 Annual General Meeting focused on the cross-disciplinary exploration of emergent phenomena in biology. Interactions between cells or organisms at small scales within a system can govern patterns occurring at larger scales in space, time, or biological complexity. This theme recurs in many sub-disciplines of biology, including cell and developmental biology, evolution, and ecology. This symposium, and the associated special issue introduced here, showcases a wide range of cross-disciplinary collaborations among biologists, physicists, and engineers. Technological advancements in microscopy and microfluidics, as well as complementary advances in mathematical modelling and associated theory demonstrate the timeliness of this issue. This introduction seeks to provide useful background information to place the studies within this issue in a broader biophysical context and highlight similarities in ideas and approaches across systems and sub-disciplines. We hope to demonstrate that cross-disciplinary research linking small-scale biophysics to larger-scale emergent phenomena can help us understand problems ranging from single-cell behaviors to tissue formation and function, evolution of form, and the dynamics of communities.
在2023年实验生物学学会（SICB）年会上举办的“由小规模生物物理过程产生的大规模生物现象”研讨会聚焦于生物学中涌现现象的跨学科探索。系统内小规模的细胞间或生物间相互作用能够支配在空间、时间或生物复杂性方面更大尺度上出现的模式。这一主题在生物学的许多子学科中反复出现，包括细胞与发育生物学、进化生物学和生态学。本次研讨会以及在此介绍的相关特刊展示了生物学家、物理学家和工程师之间广泛的跨学科合作。显微镜技术和微流体技术的进步，以及数学建模和相关理论的互补进展证明了本期内容的及时性。本引言旨在提供有用的背景信息，以便将本期中的研究置于更广泛的生物物理背景中，并突出不同系统和子学科在思想和方法上的相似之处。我们希望证明，将小规模生物物理学与大规模涌现现象联系起来的跨学科研究能够帮助我们理解从单细胞行为到组织形成与功能、形态进化以及群落动态等一系列问题。
