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Beautiful images of animal cells cultured on surfaces are ubiquitous in biological research, but these shapes also carry valuable information about the cells and the organism that they came from. Cell morphology is an emergent property of the cellular phenotype as well as of the physiological and signaling state of the cell. Many functional changes in cells cause stereotypical changes in cellular morphology, and some changes in shape can also cause characteristic changes in cellular phenotype. Thus, controlling cell shape through substrate engineering may emerge as another mechanism to modulate cell function for human health. This review summarizes current understanding of the morphology–phenotype connection, and surveys progress in the effort to interpret and control cell morphology. Highlights Cell shape and morphology can provide a complex readout of cell state or phenotype. Some changes in shape can change cell state through mechanotransduction and nuclear shape changes. Morphological analysis may be useful to screen cancer cell populations and stem cells. Patterned substrates and hydrogels can be used to modulate cell function by controlling cell shape. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, we examined how students' perceptions of teachers and parents' need-supportive and need-thwarting behaviors, related to their intrinsic and extrinsic goal pursuits, and in turn their motivational regulations toward physical activity in virtual physical education lessons over a semester during the Sars-COV2 pandemic. Short-term longitudinal study. Students (M age = 14.43, SD = 0.99) completed the targeted questionnaires at the beginning (T1, N = 295) and the end (T2, N = 194) of a virtual semester. The results of the autoregressive model indicated that all measures were relatively stable from T1 to T2. Neither teachers nor parents' need-supportive and need-thwarting behaviors at T1 predicted students' intrinsic goal pursuits at T2, except for teachers' need-supportive behaviors at T1 negatively marginally predicted students' extrinsic goal pursuits at T2. The results also showed that intrinsic goal pursuits at T2 positively and negatively related to autonomous motivation and amotivation at T2, respectively. Extrinsic goal at T2 positively related to controlled motivation and amotivation at T2. Findings suggested that teachers need-supportive behaviors are important for decreasing students' extrinsic goal pursuits, while parents' need-thwarting behaviors relate to students' amotivation over time during the lockdown periods. Also, students' intrinsic goal pursuits would contribute positively to autonomous motivation and negatively to amotivation over time. • Neither teachers nor parents' need-supportive and need-thwarting behaviors predicted students' intrinsic goal pursuits over time. • Teachers' need-supportive behaviors marginally negatively predicted students' extrinsic goal pursuits, but teachers' need-thwarting behaviors did not predict students' extrinsic goal pursuits. • Parents' need-supportive and need-thwarting behaviors did not predict students' extrinsic goal pursuits. • Parents' need-thwarting behaviors predicted students' amotivation over a semester during the Sars-COV2 pandemic. • Students' intrinsic goal pursuits positively related to autonomous motivation and negatively to amotivation, whereas, students' extrinsic goal pursuits positively related to controlled motivation and amotivation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, a new and low-cost method for the fabrication of an electrowetting display is presented. A thin layer of PMMA was used as a dielectric on an electrode. Some 2 mm cubic holes, each representing one pixel of a display, were laser machined on a PMMA sheet and placed on top of the dielectric layer. The whole structure was then coated with fluoropolymer. The cubes were dosed with colored oil and the structure was placed in a saline environment. After applying electric potential between the electrode and the saline, water wetted the bottom face of the cubes and pushed the colored oil off the center, turning the transparency of a pixel from a minimum to a maximum. Computer simulations, the fabrication process, the dosing mechanism and the behavior of pixels in different electric potentials and their potential for displaying have also been investigated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]