Protein merlin regulates collective cell movement, promoting effective and rapid wound healing
Cells also follow a herd instinct, and they thereby communicate in a magical collective way. This is because a protein known as merlin, named after the mythical wizard of medieval England, plays an important role in collective movement of cells in the body. This discovery was made by a team headed by scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems in Stuttgart working in collaboration with University Hospital Heidelberg. In a cell, merlin registers whether and in what direction a neighbouring cell is moving and induces its own cell to creep in the same direction. It is important that cells move as a cohesive group so that wounds heal quickly and effectively, for example. If this group dynamic is disrupted, however, wounds are not only closed more poorly, cancer cells can also spread more easily in the body or embryos may be stunted in their development.