Tumor malignancy linked to rigidity
These findings could help explain why cells on plastic dishes transform, lead to new anticancer drugs
Sep 18, 2005
Tissue rigidity might help promote tumor progression, scientists report today in this month's
Tumors are stiffer than normal tissue. To determine if that stiffness contributes to a tumor's malignancy, Valerie Weaver at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia and her colleagues added cells to a three-dimensional gel culture designed to mimic the extracellular matrix, made of synthetic acrylamide or a mix of natural basement membrane and collagen. The researchers increased stiffness of the matrix by boosting either acrylamide cross-linking or collagen levels. When normal mammary epithelial cells were raised in a culture whose stiffness matched a...