Toy Story: what I have learned from playing with toys about the physics of living cells

Robert H. Austin

doi:10.1117/12.882723

11 February 2011 Toy Story: what I have learned from playing with toys about the physics of living cells

Robert H. Austin

Author Affiliations +

Proceedings Volume 7929, Microfluidics, BioMEMS, and Medical Microsystems IX; 792902 (2011) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.882723
Event: SPIE MOEMS-MEMS, 2011, San Francisco, California, United States

Abstract

Yogi Berra once noted that "You can observe a lot just by watching." A similar remark can be made about toys: you can learn a lot of physics by playing with certain children's toys, and given that physics also applies to life, you could hope that it would also be possible to learn about the physics of living cells by close observation of toys, loosely defined. I'll start out with a couple of toys, rubber duckies and something called a soliton machine and discuss insights (or failures) in how "energy" moves in biological molecules. I'll bring back the rubber duckies and a toy suggested by one of the eccentrics known to roam the halls of academia to discuss how this lead to studies how cells move and collective aspects of cell movement. Then I'll talk about mazes and how they lead to experiments on evolution and cancer. Hopefully this broad range of toys will show how indeed "You can observe a lot just by watching" about some of the fundamental physics of living cells.

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Robert H. Austin "Toy Story: what I have learned from playing with toys about the physics of living cells", Proc. SPIE 7929, Microfluidics, BioMEMS, and Medical Microsystems IX, 792902 (11 February 2011); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.882723

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KEYWORDS

Bacteria

Physics

Resistance

Molecules

Microfabrication

Cancer

Thermodynamics

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