Methods Cell Biol 2008 Jan 01;89:623-52. doi: 10.1016/S0091-679X(08)00624-9.

Chapter 24: Computational modeling of self-organized spindle formation.

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In this chapter, we provide a derivation and computational details of a biophysical model we introduced to describe the self-organized mitotic spindle formation properties in the chromosome dominated pathway studied in Xenopus meiotic extracts. The mitotic spindle is a biological structure composed of microtubules. This structure forms the scaffold on which mitosis and cytokinesis occurs. Despite the seeming mechanical simplicity of the spindle itself, its formation and the way in which it is used in mitosis and cytokinesis is complex and not fully understood. Biophysical modeling of a system as complex as mitosis requires contributions from biologists, biochemists, mathematicians, physicists, and software engineers. This chapter is written for biologists and biochemists who wish to understand how biophysical modeling can complement a program of biological experimentation. It is also written for a physicist, computer scientist, or mathematician unfamiliar with this class of biological physics model. We will describe how we built such a mathematical model and its numerical simulator to obtain results that agree with many of the results found experimentally. The components of this system are large enough to be described in terms of coarse-grained approximations. We will discuss how to properly model such systems and will suggest effective tradeoffs between reliability, simulation speed, and accuracy. At all times we have in mind the realistic biophysical properties of the system we are trying to model.

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