Below, we list recent publications leveraging Coherent Structures to understand and control living and active matter flows.

• Dynamic Morphoskeletons in Development: Robust quantification and experimental variability of in-toto morphogenetic flows during Chick and Drosophila gastrulation. Serra, M., Streichan, S., Chuai, M., Weijer, C. J., & Mahadevan, L. (2020). Dynamic morphoskeletons in development. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 117(21), 11444-11449.

• A multimodal zebrafish developmental atlas reveals the state-transition dynamics of late-vertebrate pluripotent axial progenitors: Repelling LCSs reveals hidden embryo compartmentalization and subsequent fate bifurcation in Zebrafish embryonic development during body axis elongation. Lange, M., Granados, A., VijayKumar, S., Bragantini, J., Ancheta, S., Kim, Y. J., … & Royer, L. A. (2024). A multimodal zebrafish developmental atlas reveals the state-transition dynamics of late-vertebrate pluripotent axial progenitors. Cell, 187(23), 6742-6759.

• Defect-mediated dynamics of coherent structures in active nematics: Attracting and Repelling LCSs—steered by topological defects—reveal distinct, dynamic transport and deformation patterns in active nematics. Serra, M., Lemma, L., Giomi, L., Dogic, Z., & Mahadevan, L. (2023). Defect-mediated dynamics of coherent structures in active nematics. Nature Physics, 19(9), 1355-1361.

• Optimal Control of Short-Time Attractors in Active Nematics: Attracting Eulerian Coherent Structures enables the design of short-time material traps in Active Nematics flows. Sinigaglia, C., Braghin, F., & Serra, M. (2024). Optimal control of short-time attractors in active nematics. Physical Review Letters, 132(21), 218302.

• A mechanochemical model recapitulates distinct vertebrate gastrulation modes: Mechanistic principles, Control and phenotypic variability of Attracting LCSs in multicellular flows during avian gastrulation. Serra, M., Serrano Nájera, G., Chuai, M., Plum, A. M., Santhosh, S., Spandan, V., … & Mahadevan, L. (2023). A mechanochemical model recapitulates distinct vertebrate gastrulation modes. Science advances, 9(49), eadh8152.

• Control of epiblast cell fate by mechanical cues: Repelling LCSs reveals hidden embryo compartmentalization and mediate cell-fate bifurcations in chick embryogenesis at stages HH4-HH8. Guillot, C., Djeffal, Y., Serra, M., & Pourquié, O. (2024). Control of epiblast cell fate by mechanical cues. bioRxiv, 2024-06.

• Morphogen Patterning in Dynamic Tissues: Attracting and Repelling LCSs mediates diffusive morphogen transport in dynamic tissues, revealing synergies between morphogenetic movements and morphogen patterning. Plum, A. M., & Serra, M. (2025). Morphogen Patterning in Dynamic Tissues. bioRxiv, 2025-01.