# Towards the cellular-scale simulation of motor-driven cytoskeletal assemblies Source: [Towards the cellular-scale simulation of motor-driven cytoskeletal assemblies]() Collection index: [llms.txt]() Data updated: 2025-10-25T03:30:07.303Z Authors: Wen Yan, Saad Ansari, Adam Lamson, Matthew A. Glaser, Meredith Betterton, Michael J. Shelley Published: 2021-09-16T20:11:37.000Z ## Abstract The cytoskeleton -- a collection of polymeric filaments, molecular motors, and crosslinkers -- is a foundational example of active matter, and in the cell assembles into organelles that guide basic biological functions. Simulation of cytoskeletal assemblies is an important tool for modeling cellular processes and understanding their surprising material properties. Here we present aLENS, a novel computational framework to surmount the limits of conventional simulation methods. We model molecular motors with crosslinking kinetics that adhere to a thermodynamic energy landscape, and integrate the system dynamics while efficiently and stably enforcing hard-body repulsion between filaments -- molecular potentials are entirely avoided in imposing steric constraints. Utilizing parallel computing, we simulate different mixtures of tens to hundreds of thousands of cytoskeletal filaments and crosslinking motors, recapitulating self-emergent phenomena such as bundle formation and buckling, and elucidating how motor type, thermal fluctuations, internal stresses, and confinement determine the evolution of active matter aggregates. ## Recorded benchmark results A research result applies to its stated dataset, split, metric and evaluation configuration. Compare like-for-like settings, preserve the metric's unit and direction, and distinguish paper-reported results from independent reproduction. The best result recorded here is not a claim of exhaustive, current global coverage. ## Original sources and implementation [Original paper]() [PDF]()