Calcium and actomyosin pulses drive tricellular zipping to remodel epithelial cell-cell junctions and facilitate cell packing

Calcium flashes drive localized, pulsatile actomyosin contractility that enables efficient tricellular zipping, remodeling tricellular vertices during epithelial packing in blastula-stage Xenopus laevis embryos.

• Why it matters: Coordinated upstream signals that locally remodel junctions in rapidly proliferating developing epithelia are unclear, limiting understanding of how cell geometry and packing are synchronized during morphogenesis.
• What they did: Using modeling and live imaging in blastula-stage Xenopus laevis, the study links vertex displacement to actomyosin-dependent asymmetric force generation and adaptor enrichment, and tests the role of transient calcium signaling.
• The result: Disrupting transient calcium signaling affects cell packing in Drosophila melanogaster embryos and impairs mesoderm internalization, supporting a conserved role for calcium-driven, pulsatile contractility in local junctional rearrangements.

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