Clonal dominance in excitable cell networks. Author Jasmin Alsous, Jan Rozman, Robert Marmion, Andrej Košmrlj, Stanislav Shvartsman Publication Year 2021 Type Journal Article Abstract Clonal dominance arises when the descendants (clones) of one or a few founder cells contribute disproportionally to the final structure during collective growth [1-8]. In contexts such as bacterial growth, tumorigenesis, and stem cell reprogramming [2-4], this phenomenon is often attributed to pre-existing propensities for dominance, while in stem cell homeostasis, neutral drift dynamics are invoked [5,6]. The mechanistic origin of clonal dominance during development, where it is increasingly documented [1,6-8], is less understood. Here, we investigate this phenomenon in the follicle epithelium, a system in which the joint growth dynamics of cell lineage trees can be reconstructed. We demonstrate that clonal dominance can emerge spontaneously, in the absence of pre-existing biases, as a collective property of evolving excitable networks through coupling of divisions among connected cells. Similar mechanisms have been identified in forest fires and evolving opinion networks [9-11]; we show that the spatial coupling of excitable units explains a critical feature of the development of the organism, with implications for tissue organization and dynamics [1,12,13]. Journal Nat Phys Volume 17 Issue 12 Pages 1391-1395 Date Published 2021 Dec ISSN Number 1745-2473 DOI 10.1038/s41567-021-01383-0 Alternate Journal Nat Phys PMCID PMC8887698 PMID 35242199 PubMedPubMed CentralGoogle ScholarBibTeXEndNote X3 XML