TY - JOUR TI - Controlling contractile instabilities in the actomyosin cortex AU - Nishikawa, Masatoshi AU - Naganathan, Sundar Ram AU - Jülicher, Frank AU - Grill, Stephan W A2 - Piel, Matthieu VL - 6 PY - 2017 DA - 2017/01/24 SP - e19595 C1 - eLife 2017;6:e19595 DO - 10.7554/eLife.19595 UR - https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.19595 AB - The actomyosin cell cortex is an active contractile material for driving cell- and tissue morphogenesis. The cortex has a tendency to form a pattern of myosin foci, which is a signature of potentially unstable behavior. How a system that is prone to such instabilities can rveliably drive morphogenesis remains an outstanding question. Here, we report that in the Caenorhabditis elegans zygote, feedback between active RhoA and myosin induces a contractile instability in the cortex. We discover that an independent RhoA pacemaking oscillator controls this instability, generating a pulsatory pattern of myosin foci and preventing the collapse of cortical material into a few dynamic contracting regions. Our work reveals how contractile instabilities that are natural to occur in mechanically active media can be biochemically controlled to robustly drive morphogenetic events. KW - actomyosin cortex KW - active gel KW - contractile instability KW - pattern formation JF - eLife SN - 2050-084X PB - eLife Sciences Publications, Ltd ER -