Carina Dunlop visited the Mathematical Institute at Oxford University on Friday 2nd February to give a talk in the Mathematical  Biology and Ecology Seminar Series.  The title of her talk was “Mechanical models for cell and tissue mechanotransduction“.  The ability of cells to sense and respond to the mechanical properties of their environments is fundamental to cellular behaviour, with stiffness found to be a key control parameter. The physical mechanisms underpinning mechanosensing are, however, not well understood. In this talk, Carina considered the key physical cellular behaviours of active contractility of the internal cytoskeleton and cell growth, coupling these into mechanical models. These models suggest new distinct mechanisms of mechanotransduction in cells and tissues.