The locomotion, shape and pseudopodial dynamics of unstimulated Dictyostelium cells are not random.
The dynamic periphery of unstimulated, preaggregation, hunger-stage Dictyostelium discoideum amoebae was investigated by time-lapse videomicroscopy and digital image processing. Circular maps (i.e. of each of 360 radii around the cell transformed upon Cartesian coordinates) were constructed around the centroid of individual cell images and analysed in time series. This novel technique generated spatiotemporal structures of various degrees of order in the maps, which resemble classical wave interference patterns. The patterns thus demonstrate that cell movement is not random and that cells are intrinsically vibrating bodies, transited by self-organized, superpositioned, harmonic modes of rotating oscillatory waves (ROWS). These waves appear to depend upon spatiotemporal oscillations in the physicochemical reactions associated with actin polymerization, and they govern pseudopodial movements, cell shape and locomotion generally. ROWS in this case are unrelated to the cyclic-AMP-regulated oscillations, which characterize later, aggregative populations of Dictyostelium. However, the exposure of aggregation-stage cells to a pulse of the chemoattractant cyclic-AMP induces a characteristic sequence of changes in the global cellular concentration and spatiotemporal distribution of fibrillar (F-)actin. This reaction begins with what appears to be a phase resetting of ROWS and it may, therefore, underlie the cellular perception of and response to chemotactic signals. We also develop here an analytical mathematical description of ROWS, and use it to simulate cell movements accurately.