Data from: Multi-scale quantification of tissue behavior during amniote embryo axis elongation

Embryonic axis elongation is a complex multi-tissue morphogenetic process
responsible for the formation of the posterior part of the amniote body.
How movements and growth are coordinated between the different posterior
tissues (e.g. neural tube, axial and paraxial mesoderm, lateral plate,
ectoderm, endoderm) to drive axis morphogenesis remain largely unknown.
Here, we use quail embryos to quantify cell behavior and tissue movements
during elongation. We quantify the tissue-specific contribution to axis
elongation by using 3D volumetric techniques, then quantify
tissue-specific parameters such as cell density and proliferation. To
study cell behavior at a multi-tissue scale we used high-resolution 4D
imaging of transgenic quail embryos expressing fluorescent proteins. We
developed specific tracking and image analysis techniques to analyze cell
motion and compute tissue deformations in 4D. This analysis reveals
extensive sliding between tissues during axis extension. Further
quantification of tissue tectonics showed patterns of rotations,
contractions and expansions, which are coherent with the multi-tissue
behavior observed previously. Our approach defines a quantitative and
multiscale method to analyze the coordination between tissue behaviors
during early vertebrate embryo morphogenetic events.