Vibrations of microtubules: Physics that has not met biology yet

Abstract There has been extensive study on the vibration dynamics and fluctuations of microtubules in the quest for understanding the relation between microtubule material properties and their ability to carry out several functions in cells. While experimental fluctuation analysis of microtubules has provided an important piece of knowledge about microtubule mechanics, models of microtubule vibrations struggle with providing experimentally testable and biologically relevant predictions. In this mini-review, we critically analyze models of microtubule vibration dynamics, mainly focusing on limitations of particular modeling approaches and their relevance to observed and hypothesized biological phenomena. We assess the possibility of coherent microtubule vibrations in vivo, which is the corner-stone of hypotheses about cellular electromagnetic activity, and we discuss experimental approaches which could resolve controversies about microtubule vibrations.

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