The rationalization of the growth dynamics of living systems plays a key role in the understanding of many pathological and physiological processes, as well as for designing improved strategies for diseases treatment and for tissue engineering applications. Most of the mathematical models employed to simulate the propagation of real systems can be classified into a few “universal classes”. Amazingly, real systems, at least in certain ranges of time and space, appear to follow an universal behavior.

This contribution shows results from the propagation of initially linear cell colony fronts under cell flux control. For this purpose, A549 cells from a human lung adenocarcima, were seeded on ridge-patterned substrates placed at the bottom of Petri dishes and conveniently masked to obtain a colony front forming variable angles θ with respect to the colony contour normal vector. Ridge-patterned adherent polystyrene substrates with grating periods of 11.3, 10.0, 6.6, 5.2 and 3.3 μm, and equal line-spaces were employed. The evolution of cell colony patterns was followed after about 12 h from the mask removal for 48 – 72 h, and colony morphology and geometrical characteristics of cells as well as individual cell trajectories were determined. Occasionally, cell displacements at different regions of the colony were assessed by particle image velocimetry (PIV) to infer about cooperative movements.

Cell motility characteristics, i.e., velocity, persistence and directionality, mainly determine the colony propagation dynamics and roughness development, as has been previously reported. The different constrains imposed by the ridges at the substrates and their relative orientation respect to the colony border are analized. Cell geometrical characteristics are influenced by the ridges, cell aspect ratio, defined by the quotient between the longest and the smallest radius of the ellipse with the same area as that of the cell increases in the ridge-patterned substrates. Furthermore protrusions at the colony front became wider with θ and accordingly, the colony front propagation velocity increased following a relationship that correlate with the augmented contribution of lateral growth to global kinetic. These facts are compatible with the Kardar-Parisi-Zhang equation landmarked by the nonlinear term contribution to the system propagation.