ABSTRACT
As already seen in Chapter 5, cell migration on and within tissues plays a critical role in a diverse array of processes, such as in developing embryos, where the coordinated movement of cells of different origin along ECM layers is crucial for organogenesis, and migratory defects at all stages lead to severe embryonic malformations [220]. In adult organisms, cells are normally quiescent, except in immune surveillance or inflammation, where leukocytes actively migrate from blood vessels into infected tissues and then into the lymph node for effector functions [145], and in wound healing, where migration contributes to the repair of both basement membrane-underlaid epithelium and connective tissues. In pathological conditions, cell migration is involved in chronic inflammatory diseases such as atherosclerosis, or in cancer cell invasion into ECM and metastatization [337]. The process of cell migration is finally exploited in biomedical engineering applications for the regeneration of various tissues, such as cartilage, skin, or peripheral nerves in vivo or in vitro [63, 178, 373, 418].
