The last step of cytokinesis, abscission, consists in the severing of the intercellular bridge connecting the two daughter cells after the contraction of the acto-myosin ring. As any other step of cell division, abscission has to be regulated both in time and space in order to take place at the proper time and proper place. During my PhD, I studied the temporal regulation of the abscission by the cell micro-environment, particularly by the traction forces exerted by the cells on the intercellular bridge. I used a combination of approaches to control the daughter cells 2D spatial confinement, to measure the forces exerted by the cells throughout cytokinesis, and to micro-manipulate the intercellular bridge. Counter-intuitively, a tension exerted on the intercellular bridge delayed abscission while a release of tension in the bridge induced abscission. Moreover, the temporal regulation of abscission by the environment of the daughter cells implies the Endosomal Sorting Complex Required for Transport III (ESCRT-III), the main abscission machinery. Finally, preliminary experiments suggest that this mechanism could be important for tissue integrity and morphogenesis.
