Scientists create living tissues capable of changing shape in a programmed manner

From left to right: Xavier Trepat, Pau Guillamat and Marino Arroyo.

A study led by the Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC), the Polytechnic University of Catalonia – BarcelonaTech (UPC) and the International Centre for Numerical Methods in Engineering (CIMNE), in collaboration with the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Barcelona, has made it possible to obtain living tissues capable of deforming in a controlled manner to generate reproducible three-dimensional structures.

The research, published in the journal Science, presents a new strategy for “programming” tissue shape changes by controlling, through chemical patterns, how cells orient themselves. The researchers present the goals of the study as a way to design living surfaces that can change shape by themselves, with potential applications ranging from tissue engineering to biohybrid robotics.

Confocal image of a nematic cellular monolayer

Cells that align and shape tissues

Biological tissues composed of elongated cells tend to self-organise into multicellular domains in which all cells are oriented in the same direction, much like the fibres of a thread in a textile. This is known as nematic order.

Sometimes, this order breaks down at specific points, known as topological defects, which act as points of force concentration and can influence how tissues grow, migrate or even deform. “The orientation of the cells controls the forces, and the forces can control the generation of a three-dimensional shape,” explains Pau Guillamat, a researcher in the Integrative Cell and Tissue Dynamics group at IBEC and first author of the study.

To guide these forces, the team used chemical micropatterning: they “drew” lines of a protein to which cells adhere on flat surfaces, surrounded by areas containing a polymer to which cells do not adhere. Thanks to these patterns, the cells align along the lines, creating the desired “map” of orientations. This made it possible to impose topological defects at exact positions, something that nature generates spontaneously, but in a disordered way.

Simulations that predict the final shape

Marino Arroyo, full professor at UPC, researcher at CIMNE, and co-lead author of the study, leads the Soft and Living Material Interfaces group at CIMNE, which develops computational models of cells, tissues, and bioinspired materials to study cancer invasion, epithelial mechanics, and morphogenesis, bridging mechanobiology and biomedical applications.

To gain deeper insight into the origin of tissue forces and shapes, as well as to predict them, Arroyo’s team developed theoretical models and simulations capable of anticipating how a specific pattern of cell orientations would eventually transform into a specific three-dimensional shape.

According to Arroyo, “our models have allowed us to examine different hypotheses and ultimately identify the mechanism by which cell orientation leads to the three-dimensional folding of tissues. Furthermore, they provide a quantitative relationship between the nematic pattern and the shape,” confirming that the system can be used as a predictive platform for tissue morphological design.

A wide range of applications

This research is a proof of concept, but it opens the door to many applications, such as tissue engineering, to create three-dimensional structures without the need for artificial scaffolds; biohybrid robotics, which could use deformable living tissues as biological actuators; or the design of smart living materials, living surfaces capable of reconfiguring their shape and, potentially, their functional properties.

Beyond its possible applications, this methodology also makes it possible to study phenomena found in real biology, such as organ formation or the behaviour of certain tumours. “It is a perfect tool for understanding how patterns of cell orientation influence the mechanics and evolution of complex tissues,” says Xavier Trepat, ICREA Research Professor at IBEC and co-lead author of the research.

Referenced paper

Pau Guillamat, Waleed Mirza, Pradeep K. Bal, Manuel Gómez-González, Pere Roca-Cusachs, Marino Arroyo, Xavier Trepat.Guidance of cellular nematic elastomers into shape-programmable living surfaces. Science (2026). DOI: 10.1126/science.adz9174