Self-Similar Tip Growth in Filamentary Organisms

The growth of a family of filamentary microorganisms is described in terms of self-similar growth at the tip which is driven by pressure and sustained by a wall-building growth process. The cell wall is modeled biomechanically as a stretchable elastic membrane using large-deformation elasticity theory. Incorporation of geometry dependent elastic moduli and a self-similar ansatz shows how these equations can generate realistic tip shapes corresponding to a self-similar expansion process.