As a bird flaps, a rotating vortex of air rolls off each of its wingtips.

These vortices mean that the air

immediately behind the bird gets constantly pushed downwards (downwash), and the air behind it and
off to the sides gets pushed upwards (upwash). (See this image if that’s not clear.) If another bird flies in
either of these upwash zones, it gets free lift. It can save energy by mooching off the air flow created by
its flock-mate.

This all makes sense, but it represents decades of largely theoretical work. Scientists calculated how air
should flow around a flying bird based on what we know about planes, but almost no one had taken any
actual measurements. Henri Weimerskirch changed that in 2001, when he fitted pelicans with heart-rate
monitors. He found that birds at the back of the V had slower heart rates than those in the front, and
flapped less often.

3. The natural world presents a palette of beautiful complexity. From the peacock tail and the eyespots
of a butterfly, to the evolving camouflage of the chameleon, nature loves patterns.

Biologists may be able to tell you why an animal has a certain pattern. For example, it may have evolved
its skin pattern for mating purposes, as a warning sign, or for defence purposes. However, we are still in
the dark when it comes to how the patterns are produced.

ADVERTISEMENT

Although we currently lack the experimental insight, mathematicians have been playing around with
pattern formation equations since 1952, when the great Alan Turing published the seminal paper, The
Chemical Basis of Morphogenesis. In this paper, he presented a theory that said patterns could
spontaneously appear using nothing more than a protein’s natural tendency to move randomly through
tissue and interact with other cells and proteins.

The theory is incredibly counter-intuitive, and we can only wonder how Turing discovered it. Patterns, as
Turing saw them, depend on two components: interacting agents and agent diffusion. Each component
on its own does not create a pattern. In fact, diffusion is a well-known pattern destroyer: if you put milk
in water (and don’t stir), the milk will diffuse—or spread—out across the cup. You don’t end up with
spots, or stripes of milk. You just have a cup of uniform milky water.

Turing’s genius saw through this and he demonstrated that if you combine these two components in just
the right way, diffusion could actually drive the system to form spots and stripes. This idea was so far
ahead of its time that we are still working on unravelling its complexity 65 years later.

LIGHT AND DARK

Unfortunately, biology refuses to be so simple. Diffusion assumes that the agents which create a pattern
—for example, chemicals, proteins or cells—are dumb, in that they move around space randomly.
However, in 2014, the experimental lab of Shigeru Kondo demonstrated that cells in particular are more
cunning than we thought.
Kondo’s lab works on understanding the black and white stripes presented on zebrafish, a tropical
freshwater fish, which is native to the Himalayan region. They discovered that zebrafish skin patterns are
made up of a light type of cell (xanthophore) and a dark type of cell (melanophore) that interact with
each other. Specifically, the light cells spread out tendrils to investigate their environment.

ADVERTISEMENT

Unexpectedly, Kondo’s team found that when the light cell touches a dark cell a chasing mechanism is
instigated. The light cell slowly moves towards the dark cell while the dark cell quickly “runs away”.
Complicating matters further is the fact that the chasing doesn’t occur along a straight line. The cells
move at an angle to one another, resulting in a spiralling chase.

My work extended Turing’s theory to accommodate this new knowledge of “chasing” cells. First, I
modelled the system as a set of discrete, individual cells. This mathematical model is highly accurate,
but difficult to work with. I then simplified the model by assuming that there are a large number of cells.

Having more cells may seem to complicate the system, but by increasing the number of cells you can
stop worrying about each individual component and simply consider the properties of the whole
population. To put this in real world terms, it means that when you consider the Great Wall of China,
you do not have to worry about a single brick, but rather see it as the whole structure.

4.The formation of shells can also create patterns. As the animal grows inside the shell, its home must
get bigger, and so they grow their shells layer upon layer, creating 'growth-bands', or growth
increments, within the shell. Over time, these close-to- identical bands form patterns.

Shell patterns record a complete history of what happens at the shell’s growing edge. They are a like a
diary of the animal’s life that can be ‘read’ by the mantle every time it readies itself to make more shell.

Some biology basics

The functional significance of pigment patterns on cells is not clear. One hypothesis suggests that
molluscs dispose of waste products into their shells. If this is the case, there is no strong selective
pressure on a particular shell pattern. The shell of a mollusc is made up of calcified material. When the
organism grows, the shell size increases by addition of new material at the margin. The incorporation of
pigments during this growth process results in patterns. Once made, they usually remain unchanged. (A
shell growing: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aSzp_aV998I)
What can you tell at first glance?

Pattern similarities have been found in non-related species indicating the existence of an underlying
common mechanism and that diversity is generated by minor modifications and deviation.

Looking at some elementary patterns:

linesoblique

-Lines parallel to the direction of growth indicated a spatially-periodic pattern of pigment production
that is stable in time. This is what we see in morphogenesis- how leaves, hair or feathers are produced
at regularly spaced intervals. Here it is groups of cells in the mantle gland that do so.

-Lines perpendicular to the direction of growth indicate pigment deposition that is oscillatory in time.
This could imply that the cell producing the pigment goes inactive at regular intervals resulting in stripes
parallel to the axis.

-Oblique lines are a result of travelling waves of pigment production. These waves arise when pigment
producing cells trigger their neighbouring cells so that after a certain delay, the neighbours start
producing the pigment

continuity

Since the shell grows in several rounds around the axis, the progressing shell comes in direct contact
with the shell material from the previous round. In some cases patterns were observed to continue from
the older region to the newer region without major discontinuity indicating that the older region can
initiate a travelling wave in the newer region (they can in some way ‘taste’ the older pigments).
Perturbations from the normal pattern could be due to environmental factors as well such as lack of
food, physical injury or even ion concentration. Spontaneous reaction to other triggers influence the
pattern
Most shells show highly complex patterns. This complexity can arise from superimposing the influence
of multiple pattern-forming reactions. Different reactions can also affect each other.

5. The fractal patterns of bacterial colonies

By S.E. Gould on June 9, 2013

ADVERTISEMENT

Bacteria may be single celled organisms but they very rarely exist as single cells on their own. Instead,
bacteria form colonies made up of many cells, all growing and dividing together. These colonies are
often ordered in shape and form and various physical systems have been created to model this self-
organisation; for example small vibrating rods in close proximity which organise themselves into
patterns. However these systems often miss out two of the most crucial factors of bacterial colony
development: all the cells are both growing and dividing continuously.

A group of researchers at Cambridge university used synthetic biology techniques to observe the
patterns seen in a growing colony of the bacteria E. coli. In order to observe the patterns of cell
organisation the genes for either a red, green or blue florescent protein were introduced into the
bacteria which were then allowed to grow and develop on a flat surface.

ADVERTISEMENT

There are many different reasons why bacteria should form patterns during growth and development. It
might be due to signalling molecules moving between the bacteria, adhesive forces holding them
together, or the physics of dividing shapes pushing against each other. The researchers used a
computational modelling system called CellModeller to see if they could make a system of dividing rod-
shapes that produced the patterns seen in the physical colonies.

The model was put together with a series of assumptions. Firstly, it contained only rigid elongating
capsules, the same shape as the dividing E. coli. These capsules would grow to a certain length and then
divide in half. Each capsule did not move under its own propulsion, but only when subjected to outside
forces. Finally they constrained the growth with viscous drag forces caused by the interactions of cells
pressing and growing against each other. The CellModeller model was then compared with the naturally
growing E. coli, as shown below (the graph on the right shows the fractal dimension measurements of
the bacteria and the model):
As shown by the computational model, these patterns rely not on genetic or cellular features of the
bacteria, but on the physical interactions between the growing rods and their surrounding physical
environment. The forces of the rods pressing up against each other, and jostling for space as they grow,
creates the patterns observed.

In order to explore this further, the researchers used a mutant of their E. coli strain that is round, rather
than rod shaped (strain KJB24). These cells grow and divide in the same way as the rod shaped cells, but
don't form the same pretty spiky patterns. Instead smoothed domain boundaries are seen, and large
disappointing block-shapes instead of the colourful peaks and troughs.

ADVERTISEMENT

This model uses physical interactions to create the growth patterns seen in single layer of E. coli cells.
Despite the apparent simplicity of the system, emergent fractal patterns are still seen forming. The
development of more complex models to include genetic and cellular factors seen in more sophisticated
bacterial colonies, such as those exhibiting swarming, swimming or biofilm behaviour could provide a
useful way of researching bacterial