Figure 4.
Cells Aim to Maintain Optimal Cell Size
(A) Schematic of the experimental setup. Cells are separated into size-based subpopulations by elutriation and returned to culture. After 100 hr, mean cell size and size distribution are measured using flow cytometry to see whether the cell populations maintain their original median size and discover the resulting cell size distribution.
(B) Mean cell size in each Jurkat cell subpopulation immediately after elutriation (0 hr, blue) and after 100 hr in culture (red). The data shown represent percent change versus unsorted original population. The size changes after 100 hr are statistically nonsignificant (two-tailed t test) (n = 3 in each subpopulation).
(C) Size distributions of the original Jurkat cell population as well as smallest, average-sized, and largest subpopulations after 0 hr (blue) and 100 hr (red). The cell size distributions are illustrated with violin plots, and the inset above displays a comparison between a typical density plot and a violin plot representation of the data. White oval represents the median size and the thicker black line shows the first and third quartile (Q1 and Q3, where 25% and 75% of the data are below these points, respectively). CV is shown below the size distribution plots. Data shown represent mean ± SD (n = 3) from 1–5 × 104 cells per sample. The gray dotted line indicates the median cell size in the original population.
See also Figure S4.