Mechanics, malignancy, and metastasis: The force journey of a tumor cell

A cell undergoes many genetic and epigenetic changes as it transitions to malignancy. Malignant transformation is also accompanied by a progressive loss of tissue homeostasis and perturbations in tissue architecture that ultimately culminates in tumor cell invasion into the parenchyma and metastasis to distant organ sites. Increasingly, cancer biologists have begun to recognize that a critical component of this transformation journey involves marked alterations in the mechanical phenotype of the cell and its surrounding microenvironment. These mechanical differences include modifications in cell and tissue structure, adaptive force-induced changes in the environment, altered processing of micromechanical cues…

• NS
  National Science Foundation

  Award: 0727420
• UD
  U.S. Department of Defense

  Awards: W81XWH, W81XWH-05-1-330
• UD
  U.S. Department of Energy
• AH
  American Heart Association
• AA
  Arnold and Mabel Beckman Foundation
• CR
  Cancer Research Coordinating Committee
• NI
  National Institutes of Health

  Awards: W81XWH, 1DP2OD004213
• NC
  National Cancer Institute
• DO
  Division of Civil, Mechanical and Manufacturing Innovation